


The Here and Now

by FarmingPirate



Series: The Here and Now [1]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Detectives, Drama, F/M, Falling In Love, Family, Family Feels, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Police, Rivalry, Romance, Sexual Tension, Teamwork, Tension, Time Travel, Tragic Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-06
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-11 16:21:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 46,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19113331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FarmingPirate/pseuds/FarmingPirate
Summary: Nora has spent the last few months in 2018 training with her father to become a better speedster and a better CSI. One day she bumps into a new intern at CCPD: Luke Singh, the nephew of Captain Singh. After a brief awkward encounter a friendship is born and a romance blossoms despite the task that the both of them need to overcome. Can a relationship truly stand the test of time?





	1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: Ognats**

Nora had been back for a few months now, she had been enjoying the time spent with the father she had never met. She never thought she'd meet him, a few years ago it would have never crossed her mind that she would travel back in time and meet him, The Flash, her father but she did, and to her, it was totally worth the risk of destroying the timeline. And hey, from the stories that her Uncle Wally had told her, the timeline is always able to be fixed.

The young speedster entered the police department and grinned as she always did at the chaos of the place. Every time she walked past the golden plaque placed on the wall, she would look at it and mumble the words that read on the wall, "Truth. Liberty. Justice."

As Nora span back around to walk towards the CSI Lab she bumped into a young man, knocking the files he held out of his hands all over the floor. "Aw darn it" the young man spoke as he reached to the floor and began to fumble about picking up the scattered papers as co-workers and visitors stepped over them.

"Shrap, I'm sorry!" Nora quickly apologized as she began to help the man she bumped into. "It's fine," he replied, "it was my fault anyway, I tend to trip over myself" he chuckled.

The two of them looked at each other, both on the floor picking up paper and began to laugh. "People must know we're interns," the man joked as he shook his head.

Nora released a cute laugh, "Yay us for living up to Intern stereotypes."

The two stood up from the floor and Nora handed the other Intern the bundles of paper, "I'm really sorry about that. Let me help you get them all into the correct order and files!" she apologized again as she got a clear look at him. He had short brown hair and was attractive in a 'guy next door' kind of way. He was wearing basic work attire, black pants, white shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a black-tie reaching down his chest. "You don't need to do that, I'll be fine and I'm sure you're in a rush," the Intern joked, "I'm Luke by the way, Luke Singh."

Nora's eyes widened, "Singh? As in Captain Singh?" she quickly questioned as she worried that she was about to get in trouble.

Luke gripped the files to his chest with one hand and rubbed the back of his head nervously, "Yeah, he's my uncle," he admitted, "but don't worry. I don't get any special treatment. In fact I probably get it the worst here." He joked with a hint of annoyance.

Nora released a smirk, "Oh don't be silly, Captain Singh is awesome!"

"Glad you think so Ognats" a voice spoke from behind her.

Nora released a small squeal as Captain Singh's voice made her jump a little, "Good morning Captain" she smiled.

The Captain greeted her with a tap on the shoulder as he walked past her towards his office, "And good morning to you too." He then looked towards his nephew, "Come on Luke, I need to go through those files with you."

Nora and Luke exchanged a look, both knowing he was about to get in trouble. The speedster looked towards the Captain and then back towards Luke, and as time began to slow down she scanned through the papers in her new friend's hands and assorted them into the corrected order before standing back in the same position before she used her powers.

The Captain turned back around and pointed towards the direction of the CSI Lab, "Oh and Ognats, let Allen know that we have some school kids coming in next week to do some educational tour or something about the precinct. It's about 'bright futures' so make sure he's in on Monday to talk to them."

"Will do Cap!" She replied with a cheer and an awkwardly raised fist, but she amended her reply after the look her boss gave her, "Uh, I'll make sure he knows Captain Singh!" she corrected. Her boss smiled and nodded.

The two Interns looked at each other again, "Wish me luck!" Luke shrugged as he began to follow in the direction of his Uncle. Nora gave him a warm smile, "Good luck Luke!"

She paused for a moment before heading up the stairs towards the lab and as she was halfway up the stairs, she heard the Intern's voice again, "Hey!" he called out to her. Nora raised an eyebrow and leaned over the banister of the staircase, "Yes?" she asked him.

"Ognats is your last name, right? So what's your first?" he questioned with a smile.

"It's Nora" she replied with a small laugh, "Sorry, I forget to introduce myself sometimes" she added.

Luke laughed, "Well, Nora Ognats, I look forward to working with you."

Nora smiled at her new friend once more and hurriedly climbed up the staircase before Luke could see her grin ear-to-ear. She hadn't made a friend in this time period yet, so this was a first for her.

Nora turned the corner, walked down the hallway and entered the Lab where her father was early for once. He was sitting at his desk with a pen sticking out of his mouth as he filed some reports. Barry looked at his smiling daughter, took the pen out of his mouth and raised his eyebrows, "You are looking especially happy today."

His daughter released a wide smile and then inquisitively asked, "Did you know Captain Singh had a Nephew? Or even a family for that matter?" she joked. Barry shook his head at the joke and chuckled, "Yeah, believe it or not he is quite the family man." He then turned back to his paperwork and continued the conversation "So you met his Nephew? He must have finally talked his Uncle into giving him a placement."

Nora ran her fingers across the whiteboard as she walked past it, "I guess so. Singh was calling him into his office. Do you know what he's Interning for?" she asked. Barry shrugged, and Nora rolled her eyes at him, she had learned early on that when her father was focused on a task it would hold his attention fully until he completed it. So Nora walked to her desk and slumped into her chair before kicking against the desk, spinning herself round in her chair thinking about the day ahead of her.


	2. Dork

"Damn girl you just keep getting faster and faster!" Cisco announced as he watched the yellow and purple lightning bolt around the speed lab. Nora appeared before the genius and slid to a halt in front of him, "D'you really think so?!" she beamed.

"Pffft come on, It's a fact. Check this out," Cisco said to her as he held out a tablet towards her showing her the data on the screen. "This is your progress. You're getting close to Barry's speed and within a few more months, you'll be dashing around like The Flash himself."

Nora clenched her fists and cheered, "That's so schway!"

Cisco smirked and did his signature head tilt, "Still not a fan of that word but bring it up top girl" he said excitedly before raising his hand for a high five. As Nora clapped her hand against Cisco's and the two completed their made-up handshake Caitlin entered the lab with her coat between her arms. "How's the progress going?" She inquired.

"It's going great," Nora replied, "Cisco says I'm catching up with dad!"

Caitlin looked at Nora and gave her a proud smile. "Fancy a break?" she then asked, "I'm heading to Jitters if you want to come with me?"

Nora nodded a yes and looked towards Cisco, "The usual?" she asked him.

Cisco clicked his fingers into finger-guns, "You know it."

Nora took her coat from the platform and jogged over to Caitlin. It didn't take long for them to get to Jitters as the roads were emptier than usual, but it definitely took longer than Nora wanted because Caitlin didn't want to be sped there. The two queued up in the line and Nora stared at the menu above despite knowing what she was going to buy for herself.

"Caitlin, why do they have a 'Zoom'? It seems pretty messed up to have a drink named after him" Nora questioned.

"That's one of the questions I'll never know the answer too," Caitlin replied, "but then again, it's on the secret menu so maybe that has something to do with it?"

"Probably," Nora shrugged as they walked to the end of the queue where the Barista greeted them.

"Hi! Can I get two Flash's and an XS?" Caitlin kindly said to the worker. Nora slowly turned her head towards Caitlin with an extremely excited look on her face. Caitlin saw this look in the corner of her eye and smirked as Nora released a squeal. "Pretty cool, right? By 'Flash Family' standards you've finally made it if Jitters has named a drink after you" Caitlin smirked. Nora was suppressing her urge to cheer and instead decided to pump her fists close to her chest and do a small celebratory jig.

The Barista soon came back with their drinks a gave a small chuckle at Nora's excitement. The two ladies gave thanks and headed towards the nearest table. As Nora sat down facing the direction of the entrance, she saw the door open with Luke Singh entering the Café with a satchel hanging from his shoulders. It took a few extra seconds for him to enter the place as his bag hit against the glass door and got caught against the handles, holding up a few customers from leaving and entering.

Caitlin saw Nora giggle as she watched the event unfold and turned around to see the young man enter the line. "Do you know him?" she asked with a light laugh.

Nora took a sip of her coffee and flicked her eyebrows up, "A little, we spoke yesterday. He's pretty nice."

"Nice or  _nice_?" Caitlin inquired.

Nora gasped, "Auntie Caitlin, I never expected this from you!" she laughed.

The laughter of the speedster caught the attention of Luke, and Nora noticed the man giving her a small wave to say hello. Nora gave a quick little wave back and cute smile as she sipped her drink once more. Nora was using the mug to hide what she was saying to Caitlin, "Oh my god what do I say to him?!" she nervously asked Caitlin. The scientist rolled her eyes, "You go say hello of course!" she heavily whispered to her companion.

"But what if he thinks I'm weird? I don't have any friends here so how do I not scare him off?" Nora quickly questioned as she saw Luke get closer to the end of the line.

Caitlin quickly finished her coffee, took hold of Cisco's and dropped down from her stool, "better figure it out quickly Nora" she teased before walking past Luke and smiling at him, signalling him to go sit with the young speedster. Nora placed a hand against her head and pressed her lips together, she was not mentally prepared for this.

"Nora? Hey, it's me, Luke? Do you remember me or is this coming off as weird?" The young man rambled as he talked. Nora removed her hand from her face and gave him a big smile, "Hey! Sorry, I was thinking about something" she awkwardly laughed. "Take a seat, my friend just left so I'm all alone" she laughed again before muttering, "Smooth Nora" under her breath thinking that Luke didn't hear it.

Luke dropped his bag with a thud on the ground before sitting on the stool opposite Nora.

"It's nice to see you again." They both said in unison before laughing at the coincidence.

"Great minds, right?" Nora smiled.

"So they say," Luke teased back before drinking some of his coffee, then blowing out and fanning his lips, "Hot! So hot!" he whispered in pain.

"You're such a dork" Nora said earnestly. As she too took another drink but ended up with a coffee mustache on her upper lip.

Luke Snorted at the sight before motioning towards his lips that she had something on hers and handing her a napkin.

"You definitely pull off the mustache look" he teased.

Nora gave him a serious look before swiping her finger across the cream on her coffee and dabbing it onto his nose. "You definitely pull off the 'I got cream on my nose' look!" she replied with sass despite knowing that she could have put a bit more creativity into that sentence.

Luke wiped the cream from his nose with a spare napkin as the two laughed at each other.

As the laughter died down Luke spoke up, "You know, I don't really know that many people here so I'm really glad that you bumped into me."

"Yeah, me too!" Nora nodded, "Except I've been here a few months, I just haven't done much socializing I guess," she added.

The young man pointed a thumb towards the exit, "Was she not your friend?"

Nora gave a slow shrug, "Hmm, more of a family friend so it doesn't really count."

Luke then reached down into one of his coat pockets and pulled out a small notepad along with a pen and began scribbling onto it and once he was done, he tore the paper from the pad and handed it towards the cute girl in front of him, "Here," he said with a small blush.

Nora took hold of the paper and grinned and she held it in both of her hands.

"I have to get back to CCPD now but text me, so I can save your number" He said with excitement in his voice as he lugged his heavy bag over one of his shoulders.

"I will. Maybe we can hang out sometime?" Nora asked with curiosity.

The young man nodded quickly, "Yeah, for sure!" and turned towards the exit of the café, heading towards it before spinning around to jog back to Nora who was holding out his cup of coffee towards him, "You forgot this," she giggled. Luke simply gave a light laugh along with her before nodding a thank you and leaving the café. Hitting his bag against the door on the way out.

Nora sat there looking at the phone number before pulling her phone out and adding the number into her contacts. "Contact name?" she asked herself before answering with a smirk, "Dork."


	3. The Blink of an Eye

After a long day's work at the CSI Lab going through some old cold cases and coming up short, Nora finally finished the last one. She looked at the huge stack of files on her desk and released a tired sigh before looking over to her father who was just finishing up some tests himself.

"Days like this make me wish I decided to be a gardener or something," Nora complained. Barry smiled, "You get used to it Nora, you'll soon be on auto-pilot filling everything in."

Barry's phone began to buzz on his desk and a picture of his wife appeared on screen with her name above it. He pressed the green button and held the phone to his ear, "Iris, hey! You okay?" he asked her with warmth in his voice.

As Nora shut herself of from her father's phone call, she looked at her own phone. No messages or missed calls were shown so she swiped across the screen with her thumb before looking through her contacts to find… "Dork" she whispered to herself as she clicked on the message button next to the name.

"Hey, it's Nora! How are you?" the speedster began to type before deleting it. She pressed her lips together and looked at the wall in front of her, "No, that's too friendly" she said to herself. It was yesterday she obtained Luke's number, but she was holding off on texting him per her mother's advice. Iris had told her that she should wait some time before messaging someone, so you don't come off as too eager which seemed silly to Nora, in the future people don't bother with something like this. You are either interested in someone or you aren't.

"Ah screw it," She mumbled to herself as she began to type again. "Hey Luke, it's Nora! Sorry I haven't messaged you sooner, I've been super busy!" she tapped into the message box.

A fatherly tone questioned behind her, "Who's that?"

Nora quickly locked her phone and turned to her father, "Nobody!" she replied with speed. Barry raised an eyebrow and hummed an extended "Sure…"

Barry then handed his daughter her coat, "Come on, Iris has attempted to cook tonight and she's expecting us," he told her as if she had no choice. Nora gave an expressionless look, "You know she never becomes a better cook, right?"

Barry tucked one arm into his coat and wrapped it around his shoulders putting it on, "For real?" he questioned with a high pitch sigh to which Nora gave a pained nod.

As the two speedsters finished putting their coats on and grabbing their bags a light knock appeared from the doorway. There stood Luke with a nervous look on his face as he saw the two CSI's getting ready to leave. "Hi there," he smiled to Nora and Barry.

"Hey!" Nora replied as she stepped towards him with an apologetic look, "Sorry I haven't messaged you sooner, I've been super busy!"

"It's fine, police work is like that, right?" the young man said as he brushed off her apology with a knowing smile.

Barry stood there with squinted eyes as he examined their interaction and thinking of how he should react. Luke noticed this and stepped forward with an outreached hand towards Barry for him to shake, "You must be the famous Barry Allen!" he said excitedly as Barry shook his hand, "Uncle has told me so many stories about you! In fact every time he mentions you, he says how cool you are."

Barry gave his wide smile, "Sorry can you repeat what you just said. Captain Singh says I'm… 'Cool'?"

"Totally!" Luke nodded as the handshake ended. "In fact I was wondering, do you guys wanna go do something?" the intern asked the two CSI's, "I'm trying to make some friends, it's pretty awkward with me being the Captain's nephew and all" he nervously laughed.

"Uhh…." Barry said as he weighed his options. He looked towards Nora who was giving him a childish look of permission. Barry pointed towards the door, "I actually have to head home, my wife is attempting to cook so I have to be there." He apologized, "But I'm sure Nora can go?" he added as he gave Nora a way out of eating her mother's food.

The young speedster stepped forward towards Luke with a smile, "Yep! I'm free! Totally free, no plans at all. My life is boring, let's do something!" she rambled.

Luke gave a dumbfounded look at the cuteness of the girl in front of him. Before clapping his hands together and releasing an "Awesome," from his mouth. "There is this wacky mini-golf place downtown. It seems like a fun time" he said in a questionable tone, testing the waters to see what interested Nora.

"Mini-golf? That's so retro." Nora chuckled, "Let's do it!"

Barry watched with a furrowed brow as both Nora and Luke left the lab in a hurry joking and laughing about mini-golf. He tightened his lips and considered for a moment, did he just send Nora on a date? The Scarlet Speedster's thoughts stopped as he saw Iris appear on his phone again. She was quite literally expecting him to be there in an instant.

* * *

"Hole in one, ready?" Nora said with confidence to her friend. Luke motioned with his putter how to lightly tap the ball, "Not too hard this time Nora" he replied.

"I got this" Nora told her self as she struck the golf ball hitting it into the air across the open area, "Oops!" She cringed. Luke face-palmed and began to laugh, "Have you really never played this before?"

Nora fiddled with her small club and gave an innocent smile, "It's that obvious?" she asked.

Luke smiled at her and shook his head before jogging off to get the golf ball that Nora had hit away. Nora stood there and couldn't help but smile as she saw him leave to fetch the ball. She had plenty of friends in the future and it wasn't difficult for her to make them with how outgoing she can be but, in this time, in 2018, she was worried about forming any friendships because she knew that at some point she will have to leave. Nora listened to her father's advice more than anything though, he had repeatedly told her and Iris to focus on the here and now. Not the future or what happens there.

Their hands brushed against each other as Luke passed the ball back to her, "Here, try again but stop being so excessive with how hard you hit it."

"Okay, Hole in two! Ready?" Nora answered as she readied her ball, took her stance and motioned a soft swing, before hitting the ball across the small course. It rolled up the ramp, back down the slide and through the center of the windmill before stopping just short of the hole. "Come on!" Nora complained as she spun around to face Luke with a finger and thumb pressed closely together, "This close!" she motioned. Luke laughed at the girl's frustration before nudging the ball into the hole for her, "Hole in two" he winked.

"No take-backs!" Nora said with a grin.

Luke jokingly rolled his eyes, "Darn it, and here I was thinking I was going to win."

As the young man swapped places with Nora and readied his swing he paused for a moment and looked at Nora, "Do you hear that?" he asked her. She looked confused, "Hear what?" she asked.

Within not even a moment an apartment building beside the golf course exploded, scattering rubble across the area as the building set ablaze. "Get down!" Luke shouted as he knocked Nora onto the ground and out of the way from a falling block of bricks.

Luke climbed off from Nora before pulling out his phone to call the police department, "Here," he said to Nora as he passed the phone to her. "Call this in while I clear a safe perimeter" he told her. Nora raised an eyebrow and took the phone, she needed an excuse to disappear for a few minutes, "Go, I'll be quick" she nodded to him.

Nora reported the explosion as quickly as she could to the police department and then placed the phone on the small mini-golf course as she activated her ring to get into costume before bolting past Luke and into the fiery building.

Nora heard the voice of Cisco in her ear as she began to pull the residents of the burning apartments from their homes, "Nora, you at the fire?" he asked as she saw her tracker beep on the GPS monitor for confirmation. "Sure am," she replied, "I was right in front of it."

"Okay, you're going to have to be quick. That is one old building that hasn't had a safety check in years, it'll collapse soon enough. Don't bother with putting out the fire you don't have time." He informed her, "Just get the people out of there."

Nora listened to his advice and checked room after room before only having the top floor left to do. She stopped outside with an injured man on her back and passed him to Luke who was waving the arriving officers towards him. "Take him," XS ordered him, "he has a head injury, some burns, and his lungs are filled with smoke. I need you to get him to a first responder as soon as they arrive."

Luke nodded towards the speedster who moved him and the injured man a few meters backwards as some fiery debris landed where they previously stood. A shriek of fear cried out from the top floor of the building as some of the structure beneath it collapsed in the flames below, "Help!" it wailed.

Not even in a blink of an eye the speedster disappeared from Luke's side and back into the building. Nora bolted up the stairs as they collapsed underneath her feet before entering the final apartment and taking hold of the woman. "It's okay, I'll get you out of here!" she said to her with a comforting voice, "I need you to climb on my back and hold on for dear life, Okay? Can you do that?" she said to the terrified woman who slowly wrapped her arms around the speedster and held tightly, "Good job, you're doing great! Everything will be fine," XS shouted over the loud crackle of the flames. A loud bang appeared from beneath them and the woman tightened her grip further. Purple lightning surged across XS's eyes and as the floor fell beneath them, the speedster charged through the apartment's window hoping to the Speed-force that she would be able to land. As she floated slowly in the air to survey her options, she saw the yellow lightning of The Flash bolting down the street towards her. XS released the woman's grip from around her neck and pushed her in the direction of The Flash who jumped into the air to catch her as XS pointed her arms towards the ground and rotated them as fast as she could to create tornadoes of wind to soften her fall.

XS hit the ground and rolled across the ash covered ground before stopping as she hit the gate that surrounded the mini-golf area. She looked at the now crumbled building that had firefighters beginning to attack it with blasts of water, she led back in relief against the gate as she realized that she had safely got everyone out of there. Nora saw The Flash checking with the paramedics to see if anyone needed to be taken extremely quickly to the nearest hospital and he looked at her with a proud smile as he held a young girl in his arms before disappearing in a red streak.

Luke ran up to the resting superhero with a small white bag that had a red cross on it, "Are you okay? Do you need help?" he asked her before kneeling beside her and unzipping the medical bag.

"I'm fine," she said with an exhausted tone before wincing at the cut on her head.

"Hold still, this will sting a bit" Luke said to her as he reached to dab some disinfectant on her cut but as he reached to touch her the speedster was no longer in front of him. The man stood there with his arm out awkwardly before raising his eyebrows and shrugging, "that's fair enough."

XS had disappeared from her friend in fear that he would recognize her, especially if he saw her in civilian clothes with the same cut on her head that would hopefully heal by the time he see's her next.

Nora sped into the Cortex of Star Labs and was met by Cisco, Caitlyn, and her father who was currently listening to his two friends talk about how the fire must have started.

Once her presence was noticed Barry turned to his daughter and pulled her into a hug, "you did great out there Nora," he said with a proud tone as she hugged him back.

"Do you really think so?" she said with a faltering happy smile as she worried that he was just saying that to comfort her. "I could have done better. I could have got them out sooner," she mumbled as her cheek rested against her father's chest. Barry pulled back from the hug and placed his hands onto his daughter's shoulders, "All those people have you to thank for saving their lives. You're their hero Nora."

She couldn't help but feel a warmth in her heart, for once she was genuinely proud of herself.

"Yeah, good job out there kiddo" Cisco complimented.

"Thanks uncle" she said with her smile.

Nora then jumped at the vibration in her pocket as her phone began to buzz. "Oh crud!" she exclaimed as she held her phone in her hand remembered that she had just disappeared from her date after a fiery explosion.

Nora pressed the green button and profusely apologized to Luke down the phone, "I'm so sorry! I'm safe! Sorry if I worried you!"

"It's okay," his voice buzzed from the phone, "I was just getting worried because I couldn't see you anywhere and my phone was left on the floor."

"Are you okay? Did you get hurt?" he then asked her.

Nora paused for a moment and struggled out a lie, "I'm fine, I was accompanying a lady to the hospital so I'm sorry I vanished without saying a word. I'm heading home now, and I'll give a statement tomorrow, I'm just a little shook up is all" she rambled down the phone hoping that he wouldn't catch her out.

There was a pause on the other end of the phone before Luke replied, "Okay, take your time and I'll tell my Uncle you need some rest. I'll report as much as I can, so you just rest up, alright? I'll speak to you soon?" he ended with a curious tone.

"Definitely, I'll… I'll text you tomorrow to let you know I'm okay," she stammered out, worried that she had just messed it up with the only friend she had made here.


	4. Wise Men

Nora sat upside down on the couch with her head hanging towards the floor and her short legs dangling over the top of it with a book in her hands. She heard the front door open and a deep voice, say "Are you comfy?"

"Very!" Nora replied to her Papa Joe.

The old West walk into the open room with his daughter and placed her into her baby basket. "Is everything alright?" he asked his granddaughter as he dropped into his armchair looking towards the coffee table that hid her face.

"Yep!" Nora replied as she shut her book and sat on the couch like any normal person would.

Joe watched the girl try and find a comfortable position, then sitting there silent for a few moments. The detective then counted down from three underneath his breath. "Three… two… one…" He said to himself.

"Okay I'm not alright at all." Nora admitted.

Joe looked over to his baby daughter who was still fast asleep and then moved his eyes towards the worried look on Nora's face, the scar she had on her forehead had fully healed. "Let it all out, what's bothering you little lady?" he said with care in his voice.

"Awesome! I knew you'd listen! When I was a kid, I would tell you everything and look at me now, doing it before I'm even born!" Nora laughed, finding the humor beside her worry.

Joe smiled at her, "You're doing the thing that Iris does, you're buying your time to find what you want to say," the man said with a hearty chuckle. "Come on, what's up?" he added.

Nora then began to play with her hands in anxiousness, "Okay, so… I'm in a bit of a jam. Mom always told me how you gave dad a bunch of advice about love and all that mushy stuff before he and mom got together so-"

Joe extended a hand to stop Nora from talking, "Hold up, two questions. Number one: Who is the boy or girl? And number two: Please tell me your mother told you about the birds and the bees, because I am  _not_  doing that talk again." He said with remorse, as if he was having some kind of scary flashback.

Nora paused and tilted her face at the expression on her grandfathers, "Umm… I know about 'The birds and the bees' and I'm not in love or anything" she slowly replied. "I just need advice on how to go about apologizing to someone." She added.

Joe released a sigh of relief, "Oh thank god, something easy for once."

"Anyway…" Nora began again, "I was hanging out with a friend before that fire happened and I had to bolt off without warning after it was dealt with. I apologized to him already over the phone and sent him a text yesterday, but I feel like that's not enough," she lamented.

Her grandfather began his hearty laugh, "You're just like Barry when he gets all worked up about something," he smiled, "My advice? I would go and speak to him in person, try and explain that you're sorry for vanishing. I'm sure you've given him a good enough excuse already but go that one step further because this guy has clearly got into your head."

"He is so not in my head," Nora squinted at Joe's teasing remark to which Joe simply gave her the look she saw a lot of when she was younger. His 'all-knowing' look when you lie to him. "Fine, he's in my head!" Nora whispered loudly making sure that she didn't wake up her auntie. Joe began to chuckle as the young speedster walked towards the door, but she soon turned around and sped over to him to kiss him on the forehead, "Thanks for the advice Papa Joe, you're the best!" she thanked just before speeding out of the house.

Nora ran to the Police Department thinking of the best way she could apologize to Luke to show that she meant it. She felt rather idiotic over the fact that she was getting so worked up over this guy despite only spending a short amount of time with him, she wasn't sure if this was a purely platonic thing or if she had developed a crush on the man. Nora did know however that she didn't like upsetting people if it can be avoided, so she always tried her best to be the bubbly and cheery girl that she is to keep everybody happy.

Nora stopped using her speed down the nearest alley of CCPD and walked into the precinct in search of her friend. Nora hastened to the desk where Luke had been working near the Captain only to see that it was empty, the girl frowned and peered into the window of the Captain's office to see the intimidating man scribbling onto some paper. Nora plucked up the courage to knock on the office door and entered when Captain Singh told her to do so.

"Ah, Ognats," he spoke, "what do I have the honour of you visiting me today?"

Nora nervously entered the office, "I'm actually looking for Luke, is he working today?" she asked.

Captain Singh placed his pen down and sat back in his chair, "Is this a personal inquiry?"

"I know I shouldn't be making things personal in this environment and it should be strictly professional," Nora apologized, "it's just that I need to talk to him about something and he isn't being very vocal through texts and we're not at the level where I can call him. I'm sure you can understand, you're a married man and I'm sure your husband feels like th-"."

"Nora," The Captain interjected, "I'll let you off from what you were about to say because Allen warned me about how you get when you ramble on," Captain Singh indirectly told her to watch her mouth. There was a short pause before the Captain spoke again, "And to answer your question, Luke is not in today. In fact he won't be back for another few days." He informed her with a stern look.

Nora took a few nervous steps from the door towards her boss, "May I ask why he's gone?"

The intimidating man squinted his eyes as he leaned forward onto his desk, "He's been here a week and apart from the job, you're all he has talked about so far."

Nora gave an involuntary smile but she managed to quickly hide it, "I hope he's not been saying anything bad, Sir" she replied.

The Captain gave her a hint of a smile. "He's gone back to Keystone city to empty his apartment and hand in some transfer papers. He'll return as an official Detective of the Central City Police Department." he said in a proud tone.

Nora was confused, "A Detective? I thought he was an intern?"

"He was here visiting and since he wasn't able to do any real work due to some stupid rules, I gave him all the Intern jobs because I'm that kind of an Uncle. In fact he was investigating a series of fires in Keystone like the one that happened a few days ago." the man hinted, "Now, if you don't mind Ognats, I'm quite busy and you should be too."

"Yes Captain Singh, of course!" Nora quickly blurted before scurrying towards the door, "Thank you for your time!" she smiled to him as she left.

Nora stood outside the office and thought about what she had heard, and it all seemed to click in her head rather quickly with the Captain's hints. Luke must have taken her to that golf course because he knew that the building was going to be attacked... but why didn't he tell her?


	5. Confetti

Three days after Nora's visit with the Captain, Luke returned to Central City. He stumbled into his Uncle's home carrying a few heavy bags and dropped them by the door. "I'm back!" He called out to David as Rob followed close behind him with a suitcase rolling alongside his feet.

"Is David not in?" the Captain's husband asked with curiosity, "must be another late night," he added. Rob then wheeled the suitcase into the house next to the bag, "You can go and unpack, I'll get the rest Lu."

Luke picked up one of the bags and thanked Rob as he walked towards his temporary room. He slowly opened the door to see his old bedroom that he would use when he visited as a kid. Luke smiled as he scanned his teenage room, he looked at the old posters that hung from the wall and the comics that he had left on the shelves hanging above the desk beside his bed. He walked into his room and collapsed onto the bed face first with a long sigh before rolling onto his back to stare at the ceiling. "Oh comfy bed how I have missed you," he spoke as he patted the mattress as if it were a pet.

Two quick bangs released from the doorway and an irritating sound whistled as confetti fell on top of him while his two Uncles blew on party horns. "Welcome back!" they cheered as they set off a larger series of party poppers one after the other. Luke began to laugh as the two men fired confetti with no mercy, "You're getting it everywhere" he chuckled.

Rob fired the last party popper, meanwhile David scooped up some of the confetti on the floor and dropped it onto the now sat up nephew. Luke gave an unimpressed look.

"Come on," David said as he patted his nephew's newly made confetti hat, "we had to do something, just like old times right?" he smiled.

Luke shook his head and ran his hands through his hair scattering the rainbow paper across the room. "I am so getting you back for this," he replied in a humorous tone.

"Well, you can do that after you tidy this mess up," David spoke as he pointed around the messy room. Luke opened his mouth to protest but he saw David's smirk that showed he was joking.

"Okay," Rob said as he clapped his hands together, "now that that is out of the way, let's go and grab some food. I'm starving."

* * *

"Are you sure that you're capable of eating this Rob?" Luke questioned, "David told me that you've been on quite the health craze the last few years."

Rob held the greasy burger in his hands and grimaced, "I haven't had one of these in forever."

David let out a small chuckle before putting his hand on Luke's shoulder and giving it a firm grip, "I know you're practically an old man now nephew, but I thought this would be a nice trip down memory lane before everything gets all serious."

He was right, to Luke, this was indeed a trip down memory lane. When he would visit many, many years ago, David would always treat Luke to seeing a movie and then some fast food from Big Belly Burger. It was a simple little thing that his Uncle did with him, but Luke always appreciated it. "Plus, it gives you an excuse to eat something unhealthy," the detective joked but was answered back with a "Shhh."

Rob suffered a bite into the burger and slowly consumed what was in his mouth before placing it back on the tray, "David, things are getting more serious than usual?"

The Captains mouth was full after a huge bite but once he quickly swallowed it, he released a satisfied noise, then nodding to his husband confirming what he said. "Yep, we're near Christmas and you know what that means. All the whack jobs are coming out of the woodwork," The Captain sighed before taking another bite."

"At least you have The Flash around," Luke said after throwing some fries in his mouth.

David rolled his eyes, "Come on Luke, you're in your twenties, don't speak with your mouth full for goodness sake."

Luke gave his uncle a thumbs up as he finished his fries. David squinted his eyes in challenge before they widened upon remembering something, "Your friend came and asked about you a few days ago," he told his nephew.

Luke gave a quick pause for thought, "You mean the CSI Intern?"

"Yep, Nora Ognats. She seemed pretty worried about something, she said she needed to talk to you," David revealed.

"That is never a good sign," Rob joked, "Trust me, David knows that first hand."

The detective gave a small internal cringe, "Yikes," he whispered to himself after Rob's comment.

"So? Do you have any idea what she wanted?" the Captain questioned despite.

Luke brushed off the question, "Not really. We were hanging out before the fire so maybe it's about that," he replied.

* * *

Luke sat in his chair and stared intently at the computer screen. He bit his lip in frustration and released a sigh of irritation, "this can't be real…" he whispered to himself, "…There is no damn way."

The Detective rested his cheek on his fist and huffed, "I can't believe it."

A small hand appeared in the corner of his eyes as it knocked on the edge of the desk like you would a door asking to enter. "You can't believe what?" the voice said with curiosity.

Luke quickly closed the game of space invaders on his work computer and turned to see the CSI Intern giving him a curious look. "Oh, hey," he greeted, "it's nothing, just job stuff" he added in attempt to cover up not doing much work.

"A little word of advice, you can see the reflection of your screen on the window beside you," Nora warned him, "you've been given the worst desk in the Bull Ring. I guess your 'detective' skills are lacking" she said with a hint of sass.

The detective gave a nervous laugh, "I was just taking a quick break," he answered. Luke looked at his screen and then back to Nora, "I just want to apologize-"

"Nope." Nora interrupted.

Luke gave her an astounding look, "Excuse me?" he asked her before noticing the serious expression on her face.

"Since you're not doing any work, I need to talk to you," she said before motioning him to follow her. Nora led them to the empty CSI Lab with barely a word exchanged between the two of them much to Luke's behest. As they entered the lab Nora closed the door behind them and folded her arms, "Explain."

The Detective sighed as he walked over to an unused desk to lean on. "My uncle told me that he didn't really explain it to you so do you want the long story or the short story?" he inquired.

"Long." Nora answered.

Luke noticed a cup of pencils behind him and took hold of one to fiddle with as he explained himself. "Well there isn't really a 'long' explanation but here: I was investigating a serial arsonist slash murderer and the lead I had ran cold until I found one of his old accomplices who gave me a tip-off. The only information that I got from him was that Central City was the next target, so I got permission from my Captain and Uncle to visit here to go through the archives to see if I could find anything. Due to some regulations it was easier to play off that I was an Intern fumbling about with the filing system for a few days. I guess I liked it here enough to get a transfer."

Nora stepped forward with her arms still crossed, "But you knew that there was going to be an attack but didn't tell anyone?" she interrogated.

"I'm sorry, what?" he said in disbelief, "Of course I told someone. I told the Captain who warned the fire service to be prepared, but you know how it is," he added.

"What do you mean?" Nora continued.

"The mayor and his 'budget'. The CCPD doesn't have the money to investigate an arsonist that hasn't been found since he burned down his first building. It's cheaper to just re-home the inhabitants of destroyed homes than to pour resources into finding the criminal. It's the same bullshit back in Keystone city," the Detective ranted with a hint of anger.

"I… understand" Nora slowly replied.

For a few moments there was an awkward silence. The two exchanged looks and gave meek smiles. There was one thing that was still nagging in Nora's head and it took some courage for her to ask the question, "Did you know that the building that burned during our date was going to be targeted because of you?"

"You think it was targeted because of me too?" Luke questioned, he had the same thought that Nora did.

The CSI pointed towards her computer and moved towards it, opening all the details and evidence of the fire in the Police system. "It's pretty obvious. Maybe this guy knew that you're chasing after him, so he was trying to send a message?" Nora theorized, "And besides, the explosion that set the building on fire had the exact same starting point as all of the others."

"The same starting point?" Luke repeated.

Nora clicked through multiple reports that she had permission to view which were the cases that Luke worked on back in Keystone. "The explosion always happens on a third floor and is always in the second apartment from the stairs" She answered, "does that mean anything to you?"

"Nothing sticks out in my mind right now. I'll think it over, see if anything pops up in my head," Luke replied as he leaned over her shoulder. "You're pretty good at this, are you sure you don't want to be a detective?" he teased.

"Maybe," Nora replied as she looked over her shoulder, "clearly you need smarter ones" she attempted to flirt.

The two shared a look of admiration before Luke tapped on the back of Nora's chair and took a few steps backwards, "I gotta go because I do actually have some work to do, but do you wanna work on this case together at some point?" he asked her, "You would be a lot of help."

"Yes!" She replied with haste before he could change his mind, not even caring if she seemed too eager.

"Great!" The Detective replied with a wide smile, "When are you free?" he asked. The CSI hummed pretended to consider her options, "is tomorrow evening okay?" she then replied.

"Yeah for sure!" Luke said, a smile still on his face, "I'll see you later then," he added as he inched his way out of the lab.

As the Detective left into the hallway, he called out to her, "Hey, Nora!" and when he saw the CSI looking across the room to him he shouted over to her, "is it an official date this time?"

Nora turned her face to hide a blush creeping across it.


	6. Detective

Cecile rolled her eyes and smiled as she entered the bedroom, she saw Joe sat on the bed going through some old photos of Iris and Barry. "Taking a nostalgia trip?" she asked him as she passed him the bow-tie he was having trouble finding. Joe smiled at a picture he had of Iris as a newborn and then placed a similar one of Jennabeside it, "You know, I never got one of Wally," he sighed. Cecile gave a sad smile, "Well, he is a part-time time-traveler, I'm sure if you asked he could take or find one for you if he doesn't have one stored somewhere" she joked trying to lighten the mood.

Joe released a chuckle and closed the picture book, "Do you think his future child will appear at some point?"

At that moment a knock appeared at the front door. Joe and Cecile gave each other a terrified look, "Did you just jinx the timeline?" Cecile questioned.

Joe stood up from the bed and slowly moved down the stairs with Cecile curiously following close behind. As the Detective opened the door he was met with a young, well dressed man holding a small bundle of flowers and rucksack slung over his shoulder, "Detective West?" the man questioned.

"Yeah?" Joe slowly replied.

The man with the flowers released a starstruck smile, "Hi! I'm a big fan!" he announced, "I've read through a lot of your cases involving Meta-humans and it's crazy the kind of cases you've worked on" the man rambled.

Cecile and Joe exchanged a very confused look, "Those flowers aren't for me, are they?" the old detective asked.

"Oh sorry, no. These are for Nora, she told me to meet her here?" The young man replied, "Oh, and I'm Luke by the way, Captain Singh's nephew."

Joe gave a sigh of relief, this man wasn't his grandson from the future, things were confusing enough for him. "I've heard a lot about you, it's nice to put a name to a face," he greeted as he shook Luke's hand.

Cecile interjected into the conversation, "Um, hi. Do you want to come in instead of having a conversation in the cold?" she said in a motherly tone to the two men.

Joe stepped aside to let Luke in who then followed Cecile towards the lounge area, "I'll be honest," Luke started, "I didn't know Nora knew you until earlier today so I'm sorry that I hadn't met you beforehand and just showed up to your door," he apologized.

"It's fine," Joe replied, "Honestly."

"Awesome," Luke Smiled as they all sat down to continue the conversation, "Then I have some news for you."

Cecile furrowed her brow, "News for us? What news?"

"Well it's for Joe really," Luke replied before giving a friendly smile to the man in front of him, "I'm actually your new partner."

Joe sighed and ran a hand down his face, "Listen, you might want to ask your uncle to rethink that because I've had a bad history with partners," he said with honesty.

"Me too," Luke nodded in understanding. "I know what happened to your last three partners. Two of them were unlucky and the other left to study at Midway University, lovely woman by the way."

"You've met Patty Spivot?" Joe inquired.

The new detective gave a quick nod, "Yep, I met her at a conference like a year or so ago and we kept in touch because I hounded her with questions after a presentation she gave regarding Meta-Humans. We speak every now and then and she has been a great source of help with me wanting to be a detective. She also recommended me to get to know you and Barry."

Joe shook his head at the idea of having this Rookie detective as a partner, he already has a baby at home, he doesn't want to babysit at work too. Cecile felt a look of relief as she saw Nora's purple lightning flash behind Luke and travel up the stairs. Nora then creaked down the staircase and gave an apologetic look towards her grandparents, "Hey everyone," she said in a nervous tone, "I thought you two were supposed to be going out for that super fancy dinner?"

Cecile pulled on Joe's arm, tugging at him to stand up, "We are, aren't we Joe?" she hinted. The old detective nodded a yes and reached out to shake his guests' hand, "Nice meeting you."

Luke stood up and shook Joe's hand, "Likewise. I look forward to working with you," he grinned. Cecile said goodbye to the young man as Joe walked past Nora and squinted his eyes at her, "We didn't even have a hint of warning. You and I are gonna talk about this."

Nora nervously gulped.

As the two grandparents left Nora gave an awkward smile as Luke stood in the lounge. "Sorry about that, I had an errand to run but I got here as fast as I could," she apologized.

Luke smiled but then grew curious about the situation, "It's fine don't worry, but how come you're living with Detective West?"

"Oh!" Nora released, she hadn't come up with a good excuse, but she couldn't use Star Labs or her Parents apartment, and it's not like she had anywhere else she could host Luke. "He's a family friend is all," she quickly replied.

Her guest raised an eyebrow, "Like the one at the Jitters?"

"Yep! Precisely!" the speedster agreed as she walked towards Luke to sit next to him. "And Joe is nice enough to let me stay while I intern, he and my dad are old work friends," She added onto her lie which was technically the truth.

"That's fair, who's your father? Maybe I know him through my Uncle" Luke curiously asked.

"Uhh…" Nora mumbled as she tried to think of a name, "Jeven!"

"Jeven Ognats?" Luke questioned before shrugging, "That's a cool name" he smiled. He began to unzip his rucksack and pulled out a heavy handful of case-files and dropped them in his lap before turning to look at her, "Shall we get to work?" he asked. Nora grinned and took a bundle from the big pile, "let's do it detective."

The two of them spent some time going through the files like they would do at work, they paid every word attention and analysed every detail to try and link a bigger picture together that might have been missed. After an hour and a half the two of them were getting antsy as they got through half the files but had come up with nothing.

"Is this everything connected with the fires?" Nora questioned as she placed some of the papers onto the coffee table.

Luke nodded as he read through another one.

Nora pouted at him not replying. They hadn't managed to have a proper conversation since the start of the night as Luke was taking this much more seriously than she was which made her feel pretty bad. She wanted to help him put this arsonist away, but she also wanted to get to know him more, it was a little bit selfish and she knew it.

Nora waited until her friend closed another case file and put it on top of the one Nora recently placed down before she broke the silence further, "Can I ask why you wanted to be a detective?"

Luke released a smile, "You get three guesses."

"Oh I like an easy challenge," Nora perked up as she changed position to be sitting cross-legged on the couch. "Is it because of your Uncle?" she asked.

"Nope. Two more guesses." Luke replied.

"Is it because you wanted to drive a police car?" She asked again.

Luke gave her a smile making her think that she got it right before telling her she got it wrong again, "one more guess."

"Shrap," Nora groaned, "Okay this is the one. You wanted to be a detective because you wanted to be able to tilt your sunglasses, show your badge and then give a cool one liner like you find a body in the snow and someone says, 'imagine being left in the snow' and then you say 'I imagine it would be pretty… cold-blooded'… That has totally got to be the reason!" Nora rambled on as she got fully into giving her answer.

Luke sat there with a smile of adoration of how adorable Nora can be when she rambles. "That isn't specifically the reason but it's close. And if anyone ever asks me again, that's what I'm going to say," he laughed. Nora chuckled along with him and when the laughter died down, she was still curious, "So what's the real reason?" she asked.

"The real reason?" He repeated, "The real reason is because of those old noire stories, cheesy crime shows, and action movies. I wanted to be one of those badass main characters that had the smarts to solve a crazy convoluted plan and be able to take on some sort of villain and his men all by myself," he answered with an embarrassed laugh.

"No. Way." Nora giggled as she heard the reason, "That's so lame! And I'm not sure about your toughness but you're definitely lacking with the smarts," she teased.

Luke gave her a look that agreed with her, "You're not wrong, I barely scraped through the pass mark for being a Detective. Even now I can't seem to crack this arson case."

The speedster gave him a warm smile, "Hey, I know how you feel. Recently I discovered new things I'm capable of and I sucked at them at first but the more time you spend trying to figure something out, the more it makes sense." She said with comfort as she placed a hand on top of one of his.

Luke looked where her soft hand covered his and then turned back to look at her. His eyes got lost in hers, the two of them wanted to inch their lips closer but the moment passed when Luke released a chuckle, "Did you just say that say I suck as a detective again?"

Nora gave a smug smile and an extended, "Maybe."

The two began to laugh again, Luke couldn't help but love the sound of Nora's giggle. There was such a childish innocence to it at first but when she found something hilarious, she would cackle without a care in the world. That summed her up perfectly to him, she was a bundle of joy and once she lets you into her happiness bubble you don't want to leave. She was just a ray of sunshine to him.

Luke's entrancement ended when both his and Nora's phones began to beep and buzz. Luke answered his and was told there was a current meta attack downtown. The Detective locked his phone and placed it into his pocket as he saw Nora quickly get up from her seat and began to apologize that she needed to leave. "I'm really sorry but we'll have to continue this another night," She said in a hurry.

Luke stood up from his seat and began to quickly pack the files into his rucksack before slinging it over his shoulder, "Did you get the call too? I'll drive us there."

Nora shook her head, she needed to speed off to fight the Meta but it's not like she could tell him that. "You go on ahead. Barry called me so he's picking me up," Nora lied, "besides, you're a detective so you better get there quick" she added as she walked to open the door for him. Her guest agreed and followed her to the door and then walked past her towards his car outside, "Sorry this ended so abruptly, I'll text you later!" he called out to her as he sat behind the steering wheel.

Luke turned the key in the engine, pulled the car out onto the road and drove towards the active crime scene. He flashed on his sirens and barreled throughout the city as fast as he could, with the reports coming in he was getting more and more concerned as to what he was about to get into, but he needed to get their quickly. The attention of Luke was swiftly altered when a report on the police scanner announced a current fire across from the area he was headed, he purposefully took the wrong turn from where he was originally intending to go. To him he couldn't risk it, this might be his chance to catch his arsonist fleeing the scene. Due to his haste he wasn't paying much attention to his surroundings, he was on auto-pilot if anything.

He was so caught up in the idea of finding the arsonist that when a car stopped directly in front of him he slammed on his breaks a little too late which forced him to barely miss a collision. Once the car came fully to a halt, he looked through his windscreen to see nobody occupying the vehicle ahead of him. His body felt a shock run through it as another car slammed directly into the right side of his vehicle, forcing his car to crash against a parked car beside the road. He was blocked in and injured.

A few slow seconds past before Luke saw a figure exit the car that had hit him. The figure's face was obscured in the dark of night, but the detective got a glimpse that he was holding something. This wasn't an accident and he knew it.

Luke turned the key in the engine multiple times, but it had no effect, the engine wouldn't start. "Shit," He grunted to himself.

He then heard liquid being thrown onto the back of his car and then the sound disappeared for a moment. The smell of gasoline was filling his nostrils now and the worry began to set in. Luke reached to pull out his pistol but he decided against it, he didn't want to risk setting off the gasoline so he instead opted for ripping off one of his long sleeves from the shirt he wore and wrapped it around his right hand, then gripping it into a fist as he began to repeatedly punch the window beside him. As the first crack split across the glass he heard the pouring of more liquid onto the front of the car. Luke's gaze quickly shot to where his attacker stood.

"Detective Singh," The figure announced in a graveled voice as he lit a match that illuminated his lower face. Luke repulsed as he saw melted skin and a face of hatred.

"What do you want?!" Luke shouted in fear, worrying that this was the end.

The man he questioned didn't answer. He just lingered there for a few moments more and all the detective could do was watch the match. The flame slowly enveloped the piece of wood until it eventually reached the fingers that held it, but the figure didn't retract in pain or drop the flame as it burned into the melted skin. When the fire eventually burned out in his grasp and the man was satisfied with the fear he could see in Luke's eyes he dropped the black match away from the liquid he had poured.

"Pathetic."

He simply walked away.

When his shadowy figure left all that Luke could do was sit there and look at where his terrorizer had stood.

He could still see the flame flickering in his eyesight.


	7. Trust

Luke was taken to the hospital to be monitored overnight and have his injuries tended to. When he was asked what happened by the police that found him soon after the crash all he told them was that it was a simple car accident, a hit and run by some joyriding teenagers. He knew that the sooner the Captain found out that this was a targeted attack the sooner he would be put into protective custody and taken off any active cases. The problem was, his uncle wasn't an idiot and when his family is involved, he doesn't take any chances so when he walked into Luke's hospital room the Detective wasn't surprised by the look on the Captain's face.

The man walked into the room and rested his hands on his hips, "A simple car accident, was it?" the Captain interrogated.

Luke gave his uncle a tired look as he laid on the bed, "You found out faster than I thought you would," He sighed

"Two days!" David said with a raised voice as he motioned two fingers in the air, "It took you two days to find yourself in trouble."

Luke sat up from his bed and purposefully kept his gaze away from his both angry and worried uncle. "Come on, out of everyone, you know the risk of working this job. I'm bound to piss off the kinds of people who do this," he replied.

The Captain took some steps forward and gripped the rail at the end of the bed, "They poured gasoline over you!" he shouted, "Fucking Gasoline!"

Luke looked at the opposite side of the room from his uncle, he turned his attention to the curtain that covered the one window. David sighed and took a seat at the end of the bed and wiped one of his hands down his face in stress, "Do you know who did this?" he questioned.

Luke shook his head in defeat.

"Listen, I'm not an idiot Luke. I'm just trying to protect you," The Captain sighed.

The Detective finally turned his head and saw the man at the end of the bed looking at his hands placed on his lap. One of the hands moved to wipe a tear running down his cheek.

"I know you are, but I don't need your special treatment," Luke replied, "I know you promised my mother but you have to realize that I'm a cop, just like you and everyone else in the precinct."

The Captain nodded along with what Luke was saying, he realized that this is the kind of stuff his nephew had signed up for, this is what happens when you carry a badge. He was sure that even early in his career his parents were terrified for him, it's no different for Luke.

"Uncle, don't side-line me," the detective asked with sincerity, "you know what this job means to me."

"Fine," David replied after brief hesitation, "But I want you checking in with me breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I want daily reports."

"So you're babysitting me?" Luke asked.

"Babysitting?" David snapped, "I'm helping you."

The Detective smiled, "So does that mean you'll help with that arson case?"

David sighed and shook his head, "Don't act like your attack wasn't to do with that obsession of yours. I find it almost insulting that you seriously think I don't realize that this is all connected."

"Of course you do," Luke chuckled, "which is why you'll give my case the attention it deserves," he smugly smiled.

David gave a light chuckle that cut the tension and gave Luke a side-eye look, "Wipe that smile off your face. I'll spare what resources I can, but I can't promise any more than that."

Luke reached his hand across the bed for his uncle to shake, "Thank you Uncle."

David stood up from the bed and walked over towards his Nephew and pulled him into a hug, "If you scare me like that again you're off the force," he whispered.

* * *

After Luke had been screened, tested, and made sure that he had no lingering damage he was deemed in a healthy enough state for him to leave the hospital. As he was getting dressed into the clothing his uncle had left him, he heard a light knock on the hospital door. After Luke gave them permission to enter, he was met with none other than Joe West and Nora Ognats.

The rookie detective met them with a smile, "Oh, hey! Why are you two here?" he asked with curiosity

Before he knew it, Nora had closed the gap from the doorway towards the bed and had wrapped her arms around him, "I'm so glad you're okay!" she mumbled against his chest, he could feel the vibration of her voice against him. Luke gave a confused look towards Joe who smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

"I didn't know you cared so much," Luke joked as he hugged the woman lightly.

Nora pulled back and looked at him with her wide eyes, "I should have been there with you. I'm so sorry…" she apologized. Luke looked into her eyes and was stunned for a moment, he probably looked stupid because Joe interrupted the gaze between his granddaughter and partner.

"Captain Singh asked us to pick you up because we were heading this way, and I think Nora has something to tell you, I think you should listen," Joe hinted as Nora watched him talk. The young speedster jolted in excitement, "Oh, yeah!" but then realized that the news she was about to deliver wasn't one that goes with excitement. "I actually have a lead on this case…" she hesitated.

The young detective's eyes widened, "You do?! How?" he quickly questioned.

Nora looked towards Joe who nodded in returned, "I think you two will need to be alone for this, I'll be outside, in the hallway."

Nora twiddled her fingers together in anxiousness. "Okay, Captain Singh passed the report of your attack to me and I saw that you mentioned that it was a man with burned flesh," Nora revealed much to her friend's confusion.

"What does that have to do with anything? The dude sets things on fire, he's probably just trying to be edgy and did it himself," the clueless detective replied.

Nora paced past Luke and groaned, "You can be so slow sometimes."

"I've been told. So what's the lead you actually found?" Luke asked as Nora took a seat on the bed.

The CSI hesitated and looked at the ground. She had gone over this conversation in her head hundreds of times and planned out what to say and how to say it but right now her mind was going blank.

"This is gonna sound insane, but weirder things have happened in this city," she hesitated, "but I went through the details of the first fire you encountered… I think your attacker is your ex-partner. The one who died that night." She revealed.

There was a moment of cold silence.

"No." Luke replied.

"No?" Nora questioned.

Luke nodded, "Yep, Nope."

"I know I sound crazy, but I genuinely think it's him!" Nora attempted to convince, "why else would this arsonist be targeting you specifically? He was the one who got trapped, not you!"

Luke raised a hand out to hush his friend, "Nora, I don't want to argue. You don't want to know what happened that night. So just stop talking about him. I'm getting targeted because I'm the only one who is investigating him."

"Okay…" Nora sighed with a quiver of her lip, "But do you trust me?"

Luke took hold of the bag that the nurse had placed his torn clothes in from the bed, looked at Nora and smiled to her, "You're my friend, of course I do," he replied, "But Sam is dead. We buried what was left of him, so don't remind me of it."

The speedster wiped a tear from her face before it dropped and then stood up, "Okay," she whispered, "just know that I'm here for you, with whatever you need. If you do ever need to talk about what happened…"

"I know," Luke interrupted as he walked towards his friend and wrapped and arm round her to guide her towards the exit of the room, "but what I need right now, is a drink."

Nora wasn't much of a drinker, for obvious speedster reasons, and she never really enjoyed the taste of much of it either. But she wasn't one to not be there for a friend so if she must go to a bar then she'll go. Luke and Nora decided to just walk to the nearest one from the hospital, Joe declined the offer from Luke to join them because quite frankly, he didn't want to third-wheel his granddaughter. That's just not Joe's style.

At first there was this awkward tension in the air between them because of their small dispute but after a short period of time, both of them had gotten fed up with it and decided to change the atmosphere. Once they reached the bar and ordered their drinks, they sat down with an eagerness to talk to each other.

"Okay," Luke began, "Favorite book."

Nora chuckled, "Are we seriously starting like this?"

Luke grinned as he took a sip of his pint.

Nora blushed a little, "You're going to thing this is so lame…"

Luke gave a light laugh, "I don't think I can talk, especially with those cheesy cop shows."

"You really can't!" Nora burst into laughter and Luke joined her. "Okay okay," Nora began with hesitation, "My favorite book is called Uncaged Desire…"

Luke almost spat out his drink but managed to hold it in and swallow it. "That new one from Rebecca Silver? The one everyone is reading?" He asked.

Nora's face lit up, "You've read it?!" she was so ready to discuss the book with him. She had been desperate for someone she knows to read it, but Iris and Caitlin refused to give it even the smallest chance, they both said it wasn't their type of thing.

Luke smiled at Nora's excitement but felt bad that he hasn't read the book, "I haven't I'm afraid… My Uncle has though."

The speedster covered her mouth to hide her laughter, "Captain Singh?" she said with a muffled voice. Luke simply nodded and began to laugh.

The night continued with the two of them laughing, joking, drinking, and telling stories of funny things that had happened to them. After a few drinks though, Luke's tongue was getting pretty loose with what he wanted to discuss.

"Have you ever lost someone Nora?" he asked with a slight slur to which Nora replied with a saddened look. "I've lost a few people, yeah."

"Well, me too…" Luke sighed, "You know about Sam."

The sober woman gave a knowing nod, "I do, and you don't want to talk about it. You're just drunk is all and I think it's time I took you home." She said responsibly.

As Nora began to stand up from her side of the booth Luke reached his hand over and placed it onto one of hers. "I trust you," he said to her, "I don't believe Sam is alive, but I think it might be related to him too…" he revealed.

Nora slowly sat back down and held Luke's hand that covered hers on the sticky table. "You do?" she replied with a warm tone, "why?"

"If I tell you why, I'll have to tell you what happened with Sam," he hesitated, "So bear with me?" he whispered with a worried tone as if he were scared she was going to leave.

Nora placed her other hand open onto the table for Luke to hold, she had to give him her wide-eyed look for him to move his remaining hand onto hers.

"I'm here for you." Nora smiled a warm smile.


	8. Sam

Before I get started, you have to understand: Sam was a good man at heart. I won't lie, he made some terrible choices early on in his career, but he turned it around, he had to.

He was my first partner in the force and I couldn't have asked for a better one. He took me on and taught me everything he knew and showed me all the ins and outs of what you can and can't do. He was a smart man and a good cop, or at least he was when he wanted to be. Sam's problem though? He was dirty. He passed on information to a local criminal organization, "The Lockers" to keep them from being apprehended so that they can continue smuggling and dealing their drugs, I didn't find out about this for years. He did it behind my back the entire time.

The thing is, he was so good at it that I never found out by myself, he had to tell me. I know what you're thinking, "was he trying to get you in on it?" and the answer to that question is no. He wasn't. He wanted my help because he wanted to get out of his situation with the amount of money that he owed to these criminals to pay for his wife's medicine. It had gotten to the point that they were threatening his wife and his little daughter…

I couldn't just turn a blind eye to him or the people that he loved; His wife and daughter, Harriet and Kelly, were like a second family to me. What kind of person would I be if I let harm come to them, or even turn Sam into the police where Kelly would lose her father? I just… I couldn't do that.

Sam and I talked it out, we went over his options, and there weren't many, but we managed to land on him and his family having to leave Keystone City to start fresh and hope that somehow The Lockers wouldn't care enough to go after him. The plan went well for the most part, Harriet completely freaked out on him when she found out what he had been doing but she loved him enough to stay with him and to start new somewhere else. As we were getting closer to the date they were supposed to leave, Sam was continuing giving The Lockers information (which I told him to do as to not make them suspicious), but the idiot decided to start altering the details which led to more and more arrests of their gang members and eventually they began to catch on that they were probably being played. I know that Sam had one more meeting with them before the fire, but I don't know what it was about, he kept silent about the details, but I could see that he was scared.

I think this is a good point to tell what happened that night… The night that the man who was like a brother to me died.

The night wasn't any different from the rest, but the feeling in the air was different that's for sure. The tension I felt that night was thick, and I just wanted it to be over with, as bad as that sounds. Me and Sam left the precinct as soon as our shift finished and heading straight towards his apartment building where his family was waiting for us, I was supposed to drive them to the airport before they started their new life. Sam didn't seem himself either, his skin was pale, and he was fidgeting like there was no tomorrow… I guess that part makes sense at least. Sorry, bad joke.

We barely said a word to each other as we made our way there, I did notice that there seemed to be a lot of patrols out that night, the city was covered with the flash of sirens and we had no idea what was going on because Sam decided that he wanted us to be completely off the clock tonight for his family's safety.

When I parked the car outside of the building, he told me to wait for him right there to keep an eye out. At that point it was obvious to me that he did something stupid as usual, so I told him that I would come with him, "to help with the bags," I said. He just replied with a simple, "No, we'll be fine."

I waited there for a couple of minutes, keeping my eyes out for the people that are pretending to be good citizens. You know the ones, where they're told "act natural" and they try so hard that it's so obvious that they're up to no good. Seriously, why do people tell other to act natural? It never works guys! Anyway, sorry, I'm getting side-tracked.

When I was sat there tapping away on the steering wheel to keep myself occupied, I saw these two guys with their hoods up, now I'm not saying having your hood up is a crime but it's when you've got your hands in the pockets of your hoodie as you head towards the apartment complex of my friend, that is the part that gets me suspicious. I decided that I couldn't risk them being dangerous, so I climbed out from my car and called out to them, telling them to get up against the wall for a random check and that the KCPD are searching for those who match their descriptions. I know Nora, that was a dick move on my part if they were just innocent people.

And they were.

As I was patting the first one down and checking his pockets, I heard shouting coming from the apartment, and then the sound of a gunshot. I never moved so fast in my life. I tried to open the door to the apartment, but it was locked behind a key-code that I was having trouble typing in, but thanks to those kind civilians I hassled I managed to get into the building after they typed in the code… they were residents which means I was officially a dick.

As I bolted up the flights of stairs past the frightened people running away to leave, I pulled my pistol from its holster and positioned myself next to the semi-open door of Sam's apartment, I could smell the gasoline and hear an unknown voice shouting at another, "We weren't supposed to fucking shoot him you idiot! Just throw the god damn mat-"

Before I even let them finish speaking, I barged my way past the semi-open door with my gun drawn and saw Harriet and Kelly with their arms bound and blindfolds across their eyes. Lying across from them against a wall was Sam, bleeding and pulsating from a bullet wound to his lower abdomen. This is where I made a mistake, I fired at the two men in anger because of what they did, and what they might do… I didn't want to see Harriet and Kelly die that night, I didn't want to see anyone die but mistakes happen.

One of my shots went clean into the shoulder of one of the invaders who fell on top of Kelly and pushed her into the puddle of gasoline that surrounded her father. The one with the match, well, he threw it away in fear towards Sam as he drew his weapon to fire at me.

It took all I had, but I fired a non-lethal shot into the arm he held his pistol with. The thing is, I don't think he even realized that he had set his partner on fire until the flames picked up, and the screaming happened. When I pulled Kelly from the fire, he did the same to his friend and left... luckily Kelly only got a burned arm when it could have been much worse.

I'm sorry Nora, I know this is fucked up, if you want me to stop then I will. You, sure? Okay.

I'll spare you the graphic details anyway, you don't deserve to hear them Nora. Just know that I got both of them out of there, but I had to leave Sam.

* * *

After telling Nora his nightmare, he didn't know where to look at first but when he was brave enough to meet the eyes of his friend, he could see the tears pouring from them as she hastily attempted to wipe them away before they dropped. "I'm so… I'm so sorry you had to go through all of that," she sobbed.

"Yeah…" Luke whispered with a croak in his voice as he tried not to cry about this memory of his. He hadn't thought about it in detail for years.

"Kelly, is she okay?" Nora asked with worry, to which Luke replied with letting a tear drop from his eyes. "Yeah, she's okay. Her right arm is burned but it's healed well enough over the years," he replied.

"I'm sorry to ruin your night like this Nora, fuck, this is depressing," Luke sighed as he removed his hands from hers and leaned back against the booth, "I've completely sobered up now too."

Nora didn't really know what to say, she wanted to comfort him, but he seemed like a completely different person to the happy Luke she normally speaks to. Maybe that was just his way of coping, to be happy around everyone so he doesn't think of the bad he's been through. "You know, you couldn't have done anything differently. I know me telling you not to blame yourself isn't going to help, but I just want you to know that I think you did the best you could. If Sam was here, he would thank you for saving his wife and daughter," Nora consoled.

The detective took a deep breath and released it with a heavy sigh. "So that lead, the one how I think it's related to Sam," Luke began as he attempted to shift the topic, "I think it might be the one who was set on fire by his friend. He was taken to a specialist care place but I'm not sure if he's still there or was even arrested… my old Captain from the KCPD wouldn't let me go anywhere near him or the other one." Luke revealed.

Nora nodded along with what Luke was saying, "Okay, so how do we find out the details on him?"

"Well, I guess we have to go to Keystone and talk some sense into my old boss," Luke said with brief hesitation. "That's if you want to come of course," Luke then slowly muttered.

Nora gave a sad smile to her friend and then stood up from her seat and moved to sit next to him. As she sat down next to Luke, she wrapped her arms around him and rested her head into his shoulder.

"I'm not leaving you to go through this on your own, silly," she whispered before placing a kiss on his cheek and resting her head back onto him, "I care about you."

Tears began to flow faster from Luke's eyes now and he didn't want Nora to notice so he held her tightly for a few moments more and placed a kiss onto her forehead, "Thank you Nora, for everything you've done for me."


	9. Snore

It was in the evening a few days after their talk when Nora and Luke had left for Keystone City. The journey was a relatively smooth one, the only bump being that Luke had thought he left his ticket for the train at home when in reality he had just misplaced them in the wrong pocket. At the start of the train journey Nora stole the window seat from her friend before they sat down because she enjoyed seeing what was on the other side of the glass speed past, to her it was like running except your butt is firmly planted in a comfy seat, what's not to love about that? The Detective however didn't experience much of their journey because he was mostly silently asleep in his seat swaying back and forth which Nora found hilariously adorable until the point where he almost fell into the aisle between seats. Of course Nora was a good friend and managed to pull him back towards the window where he soon enough got comfortable on her shoulder while remaining asleep. The smile that remained on her face for the rest of the journey was a small but happy one… until he began to snore.

When the train came to a stop Nora gladly nudged her friend awake and snorted when she saw his groggy looking face from sleeping. "Good morning," she teased before beginning to mock his snoring.

Luke smiled and shook his head, "Oh shush, I bet you do it much worse than I do," he retaliated as he stood up from his seat to grab their bags from the overhead storage.

"Hey, I don't snore!" she sassed a little too loudly before correcting her voice levels as to not wake up any other passengers, "And even if I did, it's not like you'll be sleeping with me anyway."

Luke dropped Nora's bag on his empty seat and then slung his own over his shoulders, "Sounds like you've got ideas," he teased before motioning her to follow him to the exit of their carriage. Nora gave Luke an 'I hate you' look before grabbing her bag and following her friend to the exit and stepping out into the cold dead of night, "Why did we get such a late train?" she asked the man who was zipping up his coat, "Because busy trains are annoying," he replied.

"They're annoying?" Nora questioned with a light chuckled as the two began to head their way out of the train station, "How are they annoying?"

"Because it's filled with people constantly coughing and shuffling about, it's annoying" Luke explained, and when Nora began to laugh louder at his statement, he knew what was coming.

"But you were snoring!" She laughed, "You can't get any more obnoxious than that!"

Luke lightly laughed along with her because of how right she was , "So why didn't you wake me up then?" he asked.

Nora's laughter died down a little as a small blush crept across her face, "Because." She replied trying to escape the question.

"Because you thought I was cute before I was snoring," Luke teased as he quickly sped ahead down the stairs to avoid the slap he would get from Nora. "Not at all!" she quickly flustered, "why would I find someone drooling on me cute?"

The Detective simply shrugged at the question to annoy her as the two left the train station and walked towards the only taxi that was parked outside. The two jumped into the car and made their way towards the hotel that they were planning on staying in, it wasn't anything fancy or expensive, it was simply cheap and suitable.

When they entered the hotel, they were met with a tired looking young lady who looked bothered by the fact that she had to do her job. The check-in process was slower than it should have been, but they were eventually given the key to their room along with a hint of attitude and as the speedster and detective opened the door and walked into their room for the night they were met with a surprise.

"Are you trying to pull a fast one on me?" Nora slowly questioned as she looked at Luke who quickly shook his head in denial, "No! Not at all! I booked two separate beds, I swear! I've got the confirmation email on my phone," he scrambled as he began to unlock his phone and search through his emails until he found the correct one. Nora watched Luke tap on his phone until a sigh of relief appeared and he showed her that he did, in fact, book a two-bed room.

Nora looked at the email a little longer than she needed to before pouting a suspicious look, "Okay, I believe you."

Luke held his phone back towards him and turned to leave the room, "I'll go talk to the receptionist and see if she can change our room or something," he announced with a worried tone as if he messed up. Nora felt bad for him, knowing what Luke was like he would probably be beating himself up over this if he thought that he had upset her, and she didn't want him to feel like that when they had both come all this way and had bigger problems to deal with. "Hey," she called out to him as he stepped out into the hallway, "It's fine," she smiled.

"It's… fine?" he asked her with a curious tone.

"Yep!" she replied as she walked towards the bed and took off her coat, "Just stick to your side, 'kay?"

Luke slowly walked into the room with a suspicious look, he felt as though he was in trouble, "I can always just sleep on the floor or something?" he offered in guilt.

Nora reached into her bag that was placed on her bed and pulled out light blue pajamas with a pink flower pattern spread out across them, "stop being stupid, I said it was fine," she replied with a somewhat motherly tone, "now get dressed into whatever you sleep in because you are so not sleeping in your underwear next to me," she chuckled but despite all the sass she was giving that she inherited from her mother, the butterflies in her stomach were running wild.

"Oh? Wouldn't be able to help yourself?" Luke joked as he began to undress top-down just wanting to get some more sleep at this point.

Nora averted her eyes and scurried off to hide in the bathroom and to get changed all while internally screaming " _Ohmygodohmygodohmygod_ ", she knew she was at the very least crushing on him, that was obvious enough for her, but she never thought that she would be in this position. She placed her face in her hands and released a quiet squeal of embarrassment before taking a deep breath and releasing it, "you're okay, you can do this XS," she said to herself confidently. All while this was happening Luke was simply yawning and getting dressed into the comfiest clothes that he had brought because he didn't bring anything to sleep in as he wasn't expecting to be sleeping in the same bed with the cutest girl he had ever met. Luke didn't really know how to proceed to make Nora the most comfortable, does he jump into bed now or does he wait for her to exit the bathroom? As he overthought this Nora opened the creaky door from the bathroom and Luke turned to see the adorable woman dressed in her pajamas while wearing a nervous smile as she looked at her friend wearing sweatpants and the most loose-fitting shirt he had.

"I don't know how, but I feel over-dressed" she joked cautiously as she walked past Luke to head to the bed but as she moved past him, she noticed a large mark on his right arm in the corner of her eyes. Nora's curiosity got the best of her, and when she was in the process of climbing underneath the covers, she stole a look at Luke's right arm to see an old burn scar running up the inside of it.

The detective noticed her looking and turned his arm a little to hide what he could of it before giving her a meek smile, "you can probably guess where that came from," he admitted before he slowly got into the right side of the bed.

Nora felt guilty for drawing attention to it, so she turned her back away from him as they both attempted to get comfortable underneath the sheets. A few minutes passed in awkward silence until Nora rolled onto the other side of her body and mumbled her apology, "Sorry, for bringing it back up."

"Don't worry about it," The Detective replied with a yawn, "I just usually cover it up is all, but you were bound to see it eventually."

Nora looked at the back of his body and released and audible shiver, "Are you stealing the sheets already?" she asked, attempting to change the topic before the night ended on a sad note.

Luke gave a tired laugh before turning his body to face her, "No, not yet anyway," he joked, "are you cold?" he then asked with a hint of concern to which Nora replied with one of her meek smiles and a timid hum, "Yeah… just a bit anyway."

"Just a bit?" The Detective repeated in a soft voice, and while assuming what she was alluding to he lifted his arm up underneath the bed sheets for her to move closer. Nora shuffled towards Luke under the sheets before taking his arm and placing it over her as she turned her back towards him. "Much better," she whispered in triumph before closing her eyes with a smile on her face as Luke placed his hand over hers and interlocked their fingers.

"Goodnight Nora, have dreams as sweet as you." Luke wished.


	10. The Kinda Girlfriend

The morning after sleeping in the same bed Nora and Luke seemed to act as if it never really happened, or more accurately it felt so natural that they didn't need to bring attention to it. Well, maybe it was racing through Nora's mind just as much as it was in Luke's but neither one of them wanted to weird the other out by talking about it. Luke knew that this day was going to be a long one, that's for sure, because today is the day where he confronts his old boss, Captain Reeds, with the progress that he has made on the case that his captain didn't care about before.

The morning went by quickly and after they finished their morning coffee the two of them were stood at the entrance of Keystone City Police Department. Nora looked up to her friend beside her and nudged his arm with hers, "hey, you okay?" she asked with an upbeat tone and a smile to help him not to worry.

Luke nudged her back and smiled, "You're here, so how can I not be?"

Yep, there goes Nora's heart skipping a beat. The speedster released a wide smile and took the hand of Luke and pulled him along, "let's do this then!" she said with warm confidence and a giggle; she couldn't help but release that giggle of hers.

The two of them walked through the entrance of the building and moved their way towards the elevator but stopped when they heard a voice call out to one of them.

"Luke!" it said, "Wait!"

The detective turned around to see a round man similar in age to him bouncing along with a coffee in his hand and a bagel in the other.

"Who's that?" Nora whispered to which Luke replied, "An old colleague."

The round man didn't stop moving when he got closer to Luke, but he did manage to finish his bagel before barreling into the detective and wrapping his spare arm around him. "I've missed you so much!" the round man pretended to cry. The detective hugged his friend back with his spare hand, "Come on man, I've only been gone a few weeks."

"But still! Who else is going to go on the coffee run with me?" the round man laughed before turning to see Nora stood beside Luke with their hands still gripping together, "Oh and who might this be? A girlfriend?" he then asked curiously.

Luke and Nora exchanged an awkward look. Nora loosened her grip around Luke's hand, but he only held hers tighter. "Kinda," Luke replied to his friend before turning to see the now pink Nora.

"Nora this is Gregory," he introduced, "Gregory, this is Nora."

"It's lovely to meet you, just call me Greg" the Officer greeted as he extended his hand out to Nora who shook it in return, "it's lovely to meet you Greg" the speedster smiled.

Greg then looked at his watch and then lightly slapped Luke's upper arm, "right then, I better get going before Susanna beats my ass for being late again," he sighed, "I'll see you two later?"

Luke nodded to his friend and smiled, "I hope so, but we're not staying long."

As Greg smiled and ran off towards his partner waiting for him by the exit Luke pushed the button for the elevator and when the ding sounded and the doors opened the two of them stepped into the empty cubicle and stood awkwardly until Luke remembered to push the correct floors button.

Again, neither one of them wanted to bring up the tension that both of them were feeling despite Luke accidentally blurting out " _maybe_ " but he decided that it was much better for him to double-down on what he had said than to backtrack on it; and besides, it's not like he doesn't have feelings for her. Nora on the other hand wasn't having any straightforward thoughts over what just happened, all she knew was that her tummy felt strange and her heart was beating as fast as it does when she is running.

The elevator soon reached the correct floor where the Captain of KCPD's office was located. Once the detective and speedster were stood outside of it Luke took a moment to get into the right frame of mind to deal with the grizzled old man. "We can do this," Nora said confidently again, "mostly because I know how to intimidate people with my mother's journalistic hounding!" she said with a sarcastic cheer at the end.

"You're mother's a journalist? That explains quite a lot," Luke joked, "but yeah, we've got this."

The detective knocked on the door to his old Captain's office who gave him permission to enter upon seeing who was disturbing him. Nora followed closely behind her friend due to feeling the intimidating aura of the Captain, it was much scarier than Captain Singh's.

"I heard last night from Captain Singh that you were heading here," the old Captain started with a graveled voice, "I told him to tell you not to bother. You know that I can't help you any more than I already have."

Luke stepped forward with no time to waste, "I know, you keep telling me that, but you have to realize that there is more to this case. I've even encountered the arsonist in person, I just need to figure out who he is."

"Who's Nora?" The Captain quickly questioned, disregarding what Luke was saying.

Nora nervously stepped forward and gave a meek greeting, "That's me Captain. I'm Nora."

"Why are you helping him with this fools quest?" The Captain questioned once more.

"Because I believe that catching the arsonist should be a priority. He is destroying property as well as people's homes," Nora responded with confidence this time due to her annoyance by the question, "and if anything, you're a fool for not helping," she then blurted out.

The Old Captain's eyes widened, "Excuse me?" he grunted loudly. "Get out," He then ordered to her, "You too Singh."

Luke and Nora exchanged looks but Luke just nodded his head to Nora, silently telling her to leave and that he can deal with this. As the door shut behind her the Captain and Luke had a brief staring contest before Luke walked forward and sat in one of the seats opposite the Captain's desk.

"I didn't give you permission to sit Officer Singh," the irritated Captain said as he gave Luke his full attention. Luke simply shrugged, "It's 'Detective Singh' now."

"Congratulations, 'CCPD's Finest' seems to be filled with morons," The Captain insulted. Luke rolled his eyes at the insult and heavily sighed, "Just stop Captain Reeds. I get it, you're a grumpy old bastard and you don't like me for obvious reasons," Luke snapped, "So I'm going to make a deal with you. Give me whatever information you have been holding back and you'll never see or hear from me again, you jumped at the chance for my transfer, so this should be like Christmas to you."

The Captain stared intently at the Detective for a few moments before sitting back into his chair, "I have told you what I can Singh. You know that. You should be grateful that I told you that the burned fucker was in holding."

"And you told me that years ago, but I need to see him now as well as know what happened to the other one," Luke quickly replied.

"I can't for multiple reasons, but mostly because the case you are following has become too personal for you, you know my opinions regarding that," Captain Reeds began, "and as much as I don't like a dirty cop like you, I'm not going to see you going too far when you come face-to-face with these criminals."

Luke pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed once more with one last ditch effort he leaned forward and looked into his old mentor's eyes, "Captain, people are dying. They're being choked to death by smoke, crushed by debris, or burned alive in their own homes. How on Earth can you live with yourself knowing that this is happening and that you have the means to stop it? Just help me. I can stop this. Deep down in that black heart of yours, you know I can."

The Captain looked away from his old officer and looked at an old picture on his desk, it was of his wife and children from at least a decade ago. "I don't have any respect for you, I think you're unreliable and I have no idea how they let you become a Detective. But you're right, I can't live with myself knowing that this is happening, so I'll take you up on that deal," He reluctantly lectured as he thought about what it would be like if his family lost their homes or met a horrible fate.

Luke nodded awaiting what information The Captain would give him.

"Liam Jacobs, the one who escaped the fire unharmed was arrested and taken to Iron Heights, he's still locked up there. The one who left with burns, Deckard Francis, was treated in hospital the night of the fire as well some time after but he was eventually taken to some special care place as you know. Deckard's representative in court managed to get Deckard house arrest for constant treatment so long as he never leaves, not that he's in much shape to do so either," The Captain finished with a humorous tone, joking at the expense of the scarred man.

"What do you mean, that he's not in much shape to leave? Does he have a burned face?" Luke rapidly questioned.

The Captain raised an eyebrow in annoyance at the increase of questions, "The man is burned pretty much all over one side, but that's what the bastard deserves. Now, will you let me give you the information you asked for or are you just going to interrupt me again?"

"Sorry," Luke apologized, "Carry on Sir."

"If you want to get in contact with Deckard, I can make it happen but it's going to take some time to arrange. He's closely monitored by some government branch, and as far as those types go, these ones are shady. I'm willing to set this up for you, but that is it, my hands will be clean of this whole shit and most importantly, of you." The Captain ended. Luke nodded along with what he was saying and then released a small chuckle at the old man's ability to consistently insult people.

Luke sat up from his seat and reached an open palm out for the Captain to shake, "Thank you, I appreciate your help Captain Reeds," he thanked in a professional manner. Captain Reeds looked at Luke's hand and laughed in disbelief before shaking his head, standing up, and shaking the detective's hand, "Catch this bastard for god sake. You've been at it for years. It's actually quite pathetic at this point," the Captain insulted one last time.

When Luke left the Captain's office, he was met with a very worried looking Nora who asked how it went with her eyes. The Detective smiled, "He's giving us what we need."

Nora jumped into the air and pumped her arms, "Yes!" she cheered before awkwardly apologizing to the people around her as per usual. "so where are we heading too next? Are we interrogating these son-of-a-guns?" she added with an attempt of an intimidating voice.

"Not yet," Luke replied, "first, we're going to go for a walk through Keystone Park, do some shopping, and then I'm going to take you to dinner."

"Oh, how forward of you Officer Singh," Nora teased with a smug smile before smoothly interlocking one of her hands with his, "and as your 'kinda' girlfriend I look forward to a romantic dinner."

The Detective's face blushed with color and he stammered with his words before he managed to form a sentence, "You are so not going to let me forget that are you?" he laughed as he gave a light squeeze on Nora's hand.

The speedster gently pulled on his hand downwards to lower his upper body so that she could plant a kiss on his cheek. She made sure it was a soft kiss that lingered a little, unlike the quick one she had given him at the bar. When her lips left his cheek she quickly walked ahead of Luke and pulled him along a little through the precinct.

The two spent most of the afternoon seeing the sights of Keystone city after walking through the city's famous park as well as feeding the ducks there, with one of the funniest moments being Luke getting chased by the hungry ducks because he wasn't throwing the food out for them quickly enough for their liking. Nora did warn him though, especially when the only duck capable of scowling began to honk at him. After their visit to the park Nora couldn't help but drag Luke into a small gift shop close by, she wanted to buy a souvenir to remember her time here as well as because Cecile asked for a magnet to put on the fridge. Luke and Nora browsed the gift shop that was filled to the brink of novelty items and little nifty things like key-chains, magnets, and badges. The speedster scanned through more or less everything that was sold in the shop until she came across two bracelets placed together, one white, and one blue with both having a polished stone connecting in the center with a Key imprinted onto it. "Oh now this is cute!" Nora beamed as she picked them up from the mixed pile of cheap jewelry. She held them in her hands and smiled before showing them to the man beside her, "Look Luke, kinda-matching bracelets! And they even show they're from Keystone because it has a Key on the stone, look!" she exclaimed happily as she pointed to the rock and laughed.

Luke couldn't help but smile at the childish joy of Nora, sometimes she can be so easily impressed that it just melts his heart, "Yeah you're right, they really are cute!" Luke agreed with just as much enthusiasm as Nora.

"I'm gonna buy them," Nora smiled, "that way you'll be able to look at it on your wrist and think of me," she grinned before turning around to head towards the cashier.

After they finished in the gift shop and browsed through some more stores it was time to grab some dinner, or in Nora's words: A  _romantic_  dinner.

The two stumbled their way to what seemed like a fancy Italian restaurant because it had a red carpet leading from the entrance towards a podium where a well-dressed man was eagerly waiting to welcome them.

Nora whispered to Luke, "I think this might honestly be too fancy," and when he looked at her, she motioned one of her hands down her body, "I'm so under-dressed!" she again whispered but louder.

The Detective scanned the lady's outfit, she was just wearing casual attire. She had a black shirt underneath a warm looking burgundy cardigan that hung just over the waist of her jeans. "Oh shush, you looking as cute as ever," Luke smiled at her as they stopped just short of the waiter who grinned at the two of them, "Ahh I must agree, but 'cute' must be an understatement, she is most surely and angel!" he greeted with a stereotypical Italian accent.

"Careful Luke, you might have some competition here," Nora teased before looking back towards the waiter, "Thank you for the kind words, are there any free tables?" she asked politely.

The waiter nodded before picking up a series of menu's, "Table for two, yes?" he asked to which the two replied with friendly confirmation. "Since you two are such a beautiful couple I have the perfect table open!" he announced as he led both Nora and Luke towards where they will be dining.

Once the Speedster and The Detective were seated and settled scanning the menu their  _romantic_  dinner officially started. Their table was placed beside a wide window that allowed them to see directly down the street where all the lamps in the dark illuminated the wide pavement that connected to all of the other restaurants and stores along the road. Their table had a pristine white cover draping down the sides with a red candle lit in the center. The orange light flickered across Nora's face as she looked at the view through the window and Luke couldn't help but look at the beauty who sat in front of him, how did he get so lucky to stumble into this girl?

"Hey, Luke," Nora said nervously as she turned her gaze from the lit street towards the man sat opposite her. Luke snapped out from admiring her and quickly moved his gaze away before re-joining it with hers, "Yeah?" he asked her with a hint of embarrassment.

"Thank you for today, it's been the happiest I have been in a long time," she replied with an earnest smile. The whole experience she has had with her parents, coming back to the past, almost losing her father multiple times, and the battles with Cicada and other Meta-Human's had been getting to her but the thought of her having to go back to the future at some point was a weight that sat heavy on her heart. Despite all the friends she had in the future, despite all the heroes that she has allied herself with, she couldn't help but prefer life in 2018 where everything is much simpler. Where her family is together, and inseparable.

"Honestly, I can say the same thing," Luke smiled, "I haven't had the best of luck in terms of friends and relationships, but you? You've made one hell of an impact on me."

Nora giggled and tucked a strand of hair behind her ears, "maybe we should have dinner before we start getting too emotional?" she teased in a slightly embarrassed voice.

The waiter from earlier sailed towards their table with a bottle of wine in his hands, "Complimentary wine on the house," he insisted as he showed the label on the bottle then hovering it above their glasses, "yes?" he asked them.

"Hell yeah, fill that glass up," Luke answered excitedly, how could he not? It is free alcohol after all. Nora laughed at him before relenting and nodded to their waiter, "Sure, I'll have some too."

The Waiter then took their orders and left to wait for their food to be cooked before returning but he made sure to leave the bottle of wine on their table. The two customers spent the next few minutes laughing and joking about stories of his experience when he first started as a beat cop. He was telling her about a time where he and Gregory were on patrol together and the two of them played some basketball with some neighborhood kids.

"So these kids were really enjoying themselves, you know? We had two teams of three with me and Greg on opposite teams. I remember him having an absolutely terrible time being able to bounce the ball so he decided the better tactic would be to give the ball to one of the small kids and then pick that kid up and run with him before lifting him up to the hoop" Luke laughed as he told the story, "Seriously, it's so much funnier if you can picture it," he laughed some more. Nora laughed along with him at the thought of the round man doing what she had heard, "You two sounded like quite the pair!" she smiled, "I saw earlier that he had a lot of love for you, it was actually pretty sweet."

Luke nodded in agreement with Nora, "Yeah, he's a real nice guy although he's a bit of an accident prone but he wants to be a Captain one day which is pretty cool. Oh now there's a question, where do you want to go after your internship? Strictly CSI?" he then curiously added.

Nora pondered for a moment and tapped a finger against her cheek in thought, "Yeah, I guess I just want to stick with being a CSI in Central City, I haven't put in much thought beyond that." She answered honestly, "What about you?"

"Well, I wouldn't mind being a Captain like my Uncle but at the same time I think I want to open a Café at some point," he replied. Nora raised her eyebrows in surprised, "A café? I would not have expected that at all."

Luke chuckled, "Yeah, nobody does. But I dunno, there's something that just seems so rewarding about it, a different kind of rewarding than catching criminals. I think I'd love it to be by a beach," he, like Nora, answered his question honestly.

"That's adorable," Nora replied, "Do it. I don't see why you shouldn't."

Throughout the rest of their dinner the two of them opened up a lot more about their dreams and ambitions, as well as what they want in the future, except Nora was a lot more ambiguous in that regard but she did pay attention in great detail in finding out what Luke might be up to in the future because before she had bumped into him a few weeks ago she had no idea he existed. She was curious as to what he would have been doing while she was growing up. Time travel is weird.

After they had finished their dinner, they walked back to their hotel hand-in-hand and their bellies full of food that was way too expensive for either of them but so worth the price not just because the food was delicious, but because of the atmosphere that the two of them had felt during it. They genuinely felt like they were connecting. They both knew they had feelings for each other, and they could both trace it back to their mini-golf date and the subsequent trust and care that was shown in the bar, and since then, it's all just felt natural to them.

The two of them walked into their thankfully cheap hotel room and Nora walked ahead of Luke and collapsed onto their bed, "What a good day," she sighed with satisfaction as her face hit the bed covers. Luke took off his jacket and dropped it onto the old armchair in the corner before collapsing on the on the bed next to Nora, "I think we went a bit excessive on the food though" he joked.

"I get hungry, okay?" Nora quickly replied, "And I offered you some bread-sticks, so you can't complain!" she jokingly sassed. "Yeah you did, while you were eating them" Luke laughed, and Nora did so along with him.

As the laughter died down, they turned their heads and gazed at each other. Nora admired Luke's face and noticed a small cut underneath the left corner of his lower lip which he probably got from his job. Once her eyes met with his again, she picked up on the color of his eyes, they were green but in the right eye there was a small chunk of blue at the bottom that would only be noticeable if you took the time to look.

There was this unspoken feeling between the two of them, like they just want to grab hold of each other and just stay that way for as long as they could. Nora was hesitant to let this feeling in, once she does, once she admits her feelings then it is going to be a difficult road from here on out, but it would probably be worth it. That's what she believed. And for Luke, he was prepared to let this feeling out, he wanted Nora to know so he slowly turned to face her and moved his hand that was furthest from her towards her cheek. The Speedster cupped the hand that Luke placed and removed it.

"Luke…" she whispered hesitantly, "You know how I feel, but if we do this, it's going to be difficult. I don't want you to hurt you."

Luke retrieved his hand and placed it onto her waist, "You won't hurt me, and even if you do it'll all be worth it If I'm able to tell you that I love you" he admitted.

"You…" Nora's voice cracked, "you love me?" she asked.

Luke gave an earnest smile and looked deeply into her eyes, "Yeah. I love you Nora."

A single tear cascaded down Nora's cheeks and the moment the light thud of it hitting the mattress sounded Nora clambered up from the bed and onto Luke, meeting her lips with his over and over again with each kiss being more passionate and hungrier than the previous. Soon enough Nora removed her cardigan and shirt and once her upper clothing was off Luke rolled on top of her in an attempt to catch his breath while he had the chance. Nora ran her hands up his torso and began to pull his own shirt from his body, not that he wanted it on anyway.

"Off. Take it all off," she told him as she began to undress not just the shirt on Luke's torso, but the clothing on her body too.

"You sure you want to do this?" Luke asked as he proceeded to do as instructed before meeting his lips back with hers. Nora pulled back from the kiss and looked deeply into his eyes and whispered, "I'm sure. I don't know what the future holds, but I know that I want you in it."

They both needed the other that night, they needed to feel the other's touch, and the warmth that radiated from the person they couldn't help but want.

They were lost and in love.


	11. Fireman

It had been over three weeks since their trip to Keystone city and time had flown by, Nora and Luke had barely spent any time apart. Even when their jobs asked for them to be somewhere else, they always found an excuse to be in the same place, even if it was a passing smile and a quick kiss but for the first time since then, Luke had to spend a few days away from her to go back to Keystone city as Captain Reeds had pulled through and managed to get Luke a meeting with Deckard Francis, the man who murdered his friend. He didn't have much time to prepare his questions, or even figure out how to feel about meeting this man face to face as Captain Reeds had informed him of his success the night before Luke had to leave in the early morning. It took him some difficulty to leave the bed as a sleepy Nora led beside him, he almost wanted to skip the difficult day ahead of him to instead just feel the warmth of her just a little longer. Despite his lack of willpower when it comes to all things Nora he did eventually manage to slowly sneak out of the bed and not wake her up which he was amazed by considering he had to roll her off from on top of him. She was an extremely heavy sleeper when she wanted to be.

Luke got dressed in his usual black Detective suit with the same colored tie wrapped around the collar of his white shirt, his badge also tucked smoothly onto his belt below the holster on left side of his chest. Luke lifted his rucksack that contained a few useful things he might need such as documents, pictures, and his lunch that Nora had made the night before with the help of his Uncle Rob. As the Detective stepped into the lounge that was placed close to the exit of his Uncles house he was met with the same man who owned it, David. The Police Captain was sat in his red striped pajamas as he sipped on a hot cup of coffee and upon noticing Luke's entrance, he gave the Detective a look he was all too familiar with from when he was young. A lecture, or a life-lesson, was coming.

Luke carried on towards the exit hoping to avoid what he knew he was going to hear from his Uncle, that he needed to be careful and that he wasn't happy that Luke was going alone to meet with the man that helped murder his friend. But Luke was wrong, David's worries that were he just didn't want his nephew to get involved with the high branches of government, especially the types that use criminals to their advantage, but most of all he just didn't want to see his Nephew get hurt.

Surprisingly, David kept silent when his Nephew patted his shoulder to signal that he was heading out, the Detective thought he managed to get out of the lecture until he heard his Uncle's voice, "Luke," it mumbled.

The Detective turned his body a little towards his Uncle as one of his palms rested on the door handle ready to turn it, "Yeah?" he answered.

"Promise me you'll be careful," the family man answered.

Luke smiled to his Uncle and nodded, "You know I will."

A few hours passed and the train ride to Keystone City didn't feel the same as it did when he visited the city with Nora, it felt cold and a little bit lonely. His right hand was shaking but he wasn't sure if it was nerves or the fact that the carriage felt cold because the window that was a few rows ahead of him was actually open. The journey passed soon enough though as he let his mind drift and fell asleep with his head resting against the ice glazed window. Once the journey was over and he had left the station down the same steps he did last time he was met by two men wearing the typical government agent attire with sunglasses and serious looking faces. Luke couldn't help but laugh inside his head as he knew Nora would make a humorous comment about his situation.

"Detective Singh?" The one agent with a buzz-cut asked with a monotone yet somewhat friendly voice.

Luke nodded as he pulled his badge from his belt and held it towards 'Agent Buzz Lightyear' who Luke had named inside his head. The Agent gave a quick glance at the badge and nodded his head towards the van, "jump on in," he said before he turned around towards the vehicle and climbed into the passenger seat. Luke followed the instructions and took a seat in the back and kept his mouth quiet until the car ride ended, and he was asked to step outside the vehicle by Agent Buzz.

The van had parked in front of a large old brick-house that was on the outskirts of the city besides some other collapsing, rundown buildings. Before Agent Buzz opened the door to the entrance of the building he turned and folded his arms, "before we get started, I have a couple of rules you need to follow."

Luke simply nodded, waiting to hear more.

"Firstly, I'm going to need your firearm," he said smugly as he held out one of his hands. Luke sighed before opening his suit to show his holster as he took his pistol from it, "be gentle," he joked as he placed it in Agent Buzz's hand who emptied the weapons clip and chamber.

"Next rule, you have been granted private access to Francis' room but you will be monitored. If you so much as make a sudden movement around him I will personally come in there and remove you. He holds valuable information, so don't do anything stupid, understand?" The Agent asked, not looking for an answer.

"Clear as day," Luke nodded.

The Agent opened the door and led the Detective up two flights of stairs and stopped in front of the door, "You have ten minutes. Use them wisely," he said before he opened the door for Luke whose gaze was met with a pair of feet as the bed ended and the beeping of machines started to sound. He slowly stepped into the room and stood at the end of the bed that would normally be used in a hospital. The man lying there had half of his face and some of his torso and left arm melted, with all different shades of pink and red burnt skin being shown, still healing. His breathes were heavy and graveled, the rate of breathing that came from him surged as he saw the man who stood at the end of the bed.

"Y-you?..." Deckard spoke.

The anger that Luke had felt all these years… it almost completely subsided. He actually pitied the state that this man was in. Had he really been like this for all these years?

"So, you remember me? Huh?" Luke asked.

The graveled breath escaped the man, "Y-yeah…" he whispered. "The g-girl…" he started, "…i-is she ok-kay?" he stammered due to his ability to speak being limited. Luke was in shock; did he really just ask how Kelly was? This is the man who was holding both her and Harriet at gunpoint, he shot Sam for god sake! How could he have a heart? Or even a conscience.

"She survived, if that's what you're asking," Luke hissed, "Although, she barely has much use of her arm and she has no confidence because of it. You and your friend ruined a precious little girls life, and for what?" he snapped before readjusting his voice levels so not to get removed from the room.

"We… It wasn't the p-plan…" the burned man stammered, "it was t-to… to help them leave… y-you were sup-posed to be our n-n-new mole." He revealed.

The Detective was taken aback, "What?" he questioned, "you guys wanted me to become your new rat?" he asked. Deckard Francis gave a slow nod, "Sam… He c-came up with th-the deal. Sc-scare you into protect-ecting his fam-family. Y-you wouldn't-t do it other-otherwise," he painfully spoke

He must be lying. Sam wouldn't do that to Luke, would he? To sell out his best friend and partner in a cheap way, he would have found another route. Sam may have been a misguided person, but he valued relationships the most; but that's just it, Luke was kidding himself. This is exactly something Sam would do, and Luke knew it. Of course he would want to protect his family at all costs at the expense of everybody else, it's the sole reason that he took The Lockers money in the first place. To afford his wife's medicine.

"So why did you kill him?" Luke roared, "You didn't have to kill him! You didn't have to burn Kelly!"

Francis released a pained cry and a wale of fear as he turned his head away from Luke, who was now expecting to be removed from the room any second… only he Agent Buzz never came. In fact he couldn't hear anything from outside the room, no sound of footsteps and no sound of muffled talking from behind the door. The Detective hushed the now crying Deckard Francis to be quiet as he attempted to listen outside, there was a light thud and then the sound of somebody tumbling down the stairs. Luke pressed a finger against his lips telling Francis to keep quiet again as the Detective hid behind where the door would cover when it opened.

A few moments past and the door to the room began to open slowly. Luke held his breath so not to make a sound and as he did so his very own pistol came into view in the hands of the attacker.

"Deckard Francis," it spoke in a familiar voice, "I've finally found you."

Luke closed his eyes to mentally prepare himself when he realized who it was, the same man who had attacked him near a month ago. The Detective barged the door shut and trapped the hand that held the pistol forcing the attacker to release it, but the door quickly swung back open and the hooded man appeared and charged right into him knocking him to the ground.

The Detective and the attacker began to scrap around on the floor with each throwing punches at the other as they rolled around the ground until Luke managed to get on top of him and to strike him repeatedly as hard as he could.

"Who. Are. You?!" he interrogated in-between punches. As he struck the attacker repeatedly, he realized that this man was burned entirely, he had no hair on his head and his facial features were barely recognizable. As Luke's arm tired his eyes locked with his opponent and something overcame him, as if he knew who this man really was. The attacker took notice of Luke's distraction and spat his blood into the detective's face and attacked him with a clean punch to the side of his head, knocking him off his body and onto the ground. The two men climbed to their feet and readied their fists with exhaustion.

The burned man spat blood onto the white sheets that covered Deckard Francis and turned back to Luke, "This fucker doesn't deserve to live, you of all people know that," he growled.

Luke saw his pistol was on the floor behind his opponent and was glad that he was the one who noticed it first. "What right do you have to decide that?" Luke asked as he stepped forward and threw a punch to the attacker who ducked underneath it and jabbed Luke in the nose and then struck him again with an uppercut.

"I have every right," the melted man roared as he grabbed Luke's head and slammed it into a knee kick, dazing the Detective and forcing him to the floor.

The Attacker turned around and picked up Luke's firearm from the ground before looking at the crying and terrified Francis that led in the bed. "P-p-lease-se," Francis begged, "I-I don't deserve-ve this."

The Attacker aimed the weapon towards Francis and fired it with no mercy. "What you didn't deserve was for it to be over so quickly," he answered to the dead man, "but Luke was here so I didn't have time to get creative."

The melted man removed the magazine from the weapon and dropped it onto the bed before he stepped over the barely conscious detective on the floor. He looked at him and chuckled as he leaned over him, "Thanks for leading me to Francis, it took you long enough to find him though."

"Who are you?" Luke grumbled.

"You'll soon figure it out," the murderer answered before stepping over Luke and leaving the building.

Luke led on the floor for what felt like an eternity as everything rattles around inside his head. What he learned from Deckard, it was true. Sam sold out Luke for his own gain, for his family, but it all went wrong. Was it his fault that it happened? Should he have not gone in all-guns-blazing like he did that night? No, that can't be true. Sam was already shot. If Luke were honest, he didn't know what to think right now even if his mind was racing a mile a minute but soon enough, he knew he'd have to stop the blood pouring from his nose and call in to KCPD to let them know what had just happened.

The detective slowly pulled his torso up from the ground at sat up to see the blood on the floor that he had beaten from his attacker's face. If the melted man was smart, he would have removed any sign of his DNA from this place. So why didn't he? This guy clearly had priorities, the smarts, and physical capable to get what he wants. Maybe he really was just in a rush.

Who is Luke kidding, why won't he just say his name? He knew he this man was, deep down he knew. He just needed confirmation that the melted man was his friend.

He need confirmation that his attacker was Sam.


	12. Little Rabbit

They had his wrists cuffed and attached to the table. He tried to tell them over and over again that he didn't do it, they  _knew_  he didn't do it because they knew _him_. They had worked with him for god sake. They just needed someone to blame and he knew that; it was easier to give their bosses something to explain what happened instead of thinking some burned man came in and killed everyone.

Luke had been sat in the interrogation room for close to two hours, the ticking of the clock was beginning to become unbearable but soon enough the entrance unlocked, and Captain Reeds stepped in. The old man walked behind Luke and sat in the seat opposite him, "Did you do it?" the Captain asked.

Luke sighed, "You know I didn't."

"It's a mixed bag," The Captain spoke, "but I don't think you did."

"So why am I here?" Luke questioned as he raised his wrists a little to show his annoyance of the cuffs.

"I got agencies up my ass about what happened. Apparently, they have all been working together and using Francis' knowledge of the ins-and-outs of local gangs to arrest them," The Captain explained, "So you can see why they're so fucked off about their source having his brains blown out. They want someone to blame."

"So they're putting me up on the chopping block?" The Detective worried. Captain Reeds paused for a moment before slowly nodding.

"What about the blood!" Luke blurted out, "Did you analyse the blood? Is it who I said it was?"

The old man shook his head in disbelief, "Singh… Sam's dead. He was buried six feet underground. I know the world has become a strange place, but people just don't come back from that kind of thing."

Luke was kidding himself if he thought the Captain would believe him, hell, he didn't believe Nora when she said she thought it was Sam. "How did things get this complicated?" Luke whispered to himself.

The Captain stood up from his chair and gave the Detective a pitiful look, "I'll do what I can for you Singh. I've called your Uncle and he's doing the same thing, but there is only so much we can do."

The old man walked out of the room and tears began to flow down from Luke's eyes. The Detective sat their contemplating what would happen until not even ten minutes after the Captain had left the door opened once more only this time a small but slender woman dressed in a suit with a serious expression on her face entered. She didn't look at Luke until she placed herself in the same seat that Captain Reeds was in and dropped a huge folder of paper onto the desk. Luke raised his eyes from looking down at his lap and met his eyes with hers, "and you are?" he asked her.

"My name's not important," she answered, "just know that I work for one of the agencies that you have royally pissed off."

Luke laughed in disbelief, "of course you are."

The woman leaned towards the folder and began to scan through it, "Your old partner was called Samuel Brown, yes?" she asked. Luke nodded.

"Good." She stated.

The Detective raised an eyebrow in curiosity, "So you've done your homework? I take it you analysed the blood, right?" he questioned. The woman's eyes moved from the file she was reading and met with Luke's, "Yes, I've done my 'homework', and if you were wondering it was indeed your old partner who attacked you," she revealed.

The shock was visible on Luke's face, but it quickly subsided when he released a pathetic laugh, "Oh man," he chuckled, "what even is my life?"

"I take it that you knew about this?" The woman asked.

"I didn't. Not until my recent encounter with him," Luke replied.

The woman closed the folder and leaned forward to grab Luke's full attention. "I'm going to be honest with you Detective Singh, there is a whole lot of shit that you have no idea about which is clear to both you and me. I'm the head of a place called Argus and we've been looking for your dead partner for a while now. So, I have an ultimatum for you…" the woman started.

"Help you or get locked up?" Luke interrupted.

"Yes" the woman replied casually. "Samuel has shown himself to you twice and we suspect he'll get into contact with you again. So, you're going to take this-" the woman ordered as she pulled out a small rectangular device with a button placed on top of it, it looked as simple as it sounds. "-and when you encounter him again you will push the button on this tracker so that we can mobilize a task-force to your location and capture him. Any questions?" she asked as she handed Luke the device.

The Detective examined the tracker in his hands before looking back to the woman with curiosity, "Am I going to get any answers at all about why you're hunting for my old best friend or are you just dragging me along for the ride?"

The woman stood up from her chair and took hold of the heavy folder on the desk, "Not until you prove yourself trustworthy, even then you'll get the bare minimum. I'm sure you know of it is," she joked which surprised the Detective before walking towards the exit and leaving.

Within the next hour Luke was released from the room as well as the precinct and was left to his own devices, he was sure the lady who visited had something to do with it. He was being used and he knew it, but he also knew that there was nothing to be done, but hey, at least the government is finally taking his case seriously… even if he's just at the tip of the iceberg when it comes to everything that is going on. Luke stepped outside of the precinct he was held at and took in a deep breath of the cold Keystone air before he pulled out his phone and called his uncle, telling him everything that happened and that some agency has decided to put him to use. Needless to say that David was furious at both Luke and the situation he had put himself in and ordered Luke to get the next available train back to Central City, but Luke still had one more thing to do. After he managed to end the phone call, he hailed the nearest cab that could take him to where he wanted to go.

Luke felt nervous when he stood outside the brown and battered door and with a quick succession of knocks that they knew him by the door opened within a few short moments with the chain lock still in place. The green eyes of the lady who answered the door grew wide and she quickly shut the door and then reopened it after loosening the lock. Luke was met with a huge embrace which he returned with just as much confidence.

"Kelly is going to be ecstatic that you're here!" Harriet said excitedly into Luke's ear as she hugged him. The Detective pulled himself from the hug and smiled at the pale blonde woman, "She'll be back from school soon, right?" Luke asked curiously.

The woman smiled and stepped to the side of the doorway so that Luke could enter, "In about ten minutes, which means we have enough time for what you're here for," she replied with a smirk as she shut the door behind him. Luke chuckled, "Oh? And what makes you think I'm here for something?"

Harriet stepped forward and headed towards the couch, "don't be an ass Luke, I've barely heard from you since you left. Something's happened for you to be here. So, as your dear friend, what's going on?" Harriet asked as she took his hand and guided him towards the couch.

Once the two sat down Harriet gave Luke a look that told him that she was expecting him to tell her everything that he has going on. She has that effect on him, the two of them had been there for each other ever since that night of horror and the days that came after that. "Okay, you got me" Luke relented with a sigh. "That case of mine has completely exploded and I have been pulled into some crazy shit. There is a lot that I can't talk about regarding it but it's really getting to me H. I don't really know what to do…" he revealed.

The blonde woman gave him a heartfelt smile and took hold of his hand, "Just do your best Luke, that's all you can ever do, and it's worked out for you so far."

Luke smiled at his friend and then slowly removed his hand from hers, "You have way too much faith in me," he replied. Harriet nudged him with her arm and gave him a sincere look, "How could I not? You saved me and my daughter's life."

The Detective clasped his hands together and looked at the wall ahead of him. He wasn't there to tell the widow that her husband was alive, he knew he should because she had a right to know but after experiencing what he was capable of and seeing what he has turned into… she was better off remembering Sam as the man she thought he was.

"Luke… what is it?" Harriet mumbled as she felt the stress radiating from the Detective who simply shook his head and brushed off the question, "Nothing, it's fine."

A sound of a key entering the lock of the front door alerted the two of them and Harriet quickly shuffled an inch or two away from Luke. The door swung open and an adorable six-year-old girl bolted into the room with a cheer but stopped a meter away from the couch when she noticed who was sat next to her mother. The girl hovered her left hand onto the opposite bandaged forearm in a nervous tick of hers before she smiled ear-to-ear and bounced onto the Detective, "Uncle Luke!" she squealed in excitement.

"Hey there little rabbit," he grinned as he wrapped his arms around the girl, sat up from the couch and span her around in his arms until he got dizzy and placed her back on the ground. "How was school today?" he asked as he ruffled her light brown hair. Kelly pouted for a moment, "It was 'kay I guess, but Jack keeps pulling my hair!" she huffed in annoyance.

Luke kneeled down to her height, "Jack? Whose Jack?" he said along with the squinting of his eyes as if he was questioning a suspect.

"That would be her boyfriend," a deep voice spoke from the doorway. A bald man with a ginger beard entered the apartment and placed Kelly's schoolbag next to the door as well as some groceries onto the kitchen's island. "How come you're here? Didn't you move to Central?" the man casually asked Luke.

The Detective's attention switched from Kelly to the man, "I had to visit the old precinct for work Grant, so I thought I'd stop by to see how you're all doing," he replied before looking back at the still pouting Kelly. "What did we say about boyfriends?" Luke asked her.

"Don't date the assholes!" She happily replied. Luke cringed as he felt the stare of death coming from Harriet. "Nonono," Luke quickly stammered, "we don't say that word!"

"Why not?" Kelly asked, "so should I date the assholes?" the six-year-old questioned in confusion. Luke stood up from the ground and patted Kelly's head before smiling at the annoyed Harriet who was also attempting to hide her laughter. "I think this is a conversation she should be having in like seven years' time," he chuckled.

"But uncle! I'm confused!" Kelly whined.

Luke spent the next two hours with Kelly, Harriet, and Grant as they all caught up about what was going on in their respective lives. Harriet had recently started going back to medical school to finish her training, while her boyfriend Grant was supporting her with the money he earns from his restaurant. It never failed to make Luke happy to see that Harriet and Kelly were living the best lives that they could despite what they experienced in the past. When it was time to go, he hugged the two of them goodbye and made his way back to the train station.

He sat on one of the empty benches and pulled out his phone to look at how long he would be waiting for his train to arrive to discover it was only a few minutes until it would, but he was sure it would be delayed like usual. Luke checked his messages to see just one from Nora that read, " _I hope your day wasn't too excessive! Sorry I slept like a log and didn't get to kiss you goodbye like usual, so next time I owe you another one! See you tonight dork, love you x_ "

Luke was thankful that his uncle hadn't told her about is altercation today, he knew exactly how she'd react and it's not that he didn't want to be on the receiving end of it, it's just that he didn't want her to worry. Although, he was sure that she would notice the scar on his forehead from the kick he received as well as the blocked nose he has due to remnants of dried blood… and the change of clothes he was given by the KCPD which was a grey hoodie and sweatpants. He knew he had to get changed before he saw her. All-in-all Nora's reaction would just be a delayed one. Luke tapped onto his phone a reply telling her that everything was okay and then closed the messaging app as a man took a seat next to him.

"How'd you get so lucky to find someone that pretty?" the man asked as Luke's background picture on his phone was shown before he locked it. It was a selfie that Nora had taken on his phone, she took the picture of herself wearing a blue hoodie of his that Luke still hadn't got back from her, but then again she did look adorable in it as it was a bit too big for someone of her height so he wasn't that keen for her to return it. "You know how it goes, boy-meets-girl by stumbling into each other and knocking paper out of the others hands at work," Luke replied.

The man chuckled, "You planned that, didn't you?"

"You know me," Luke laughed along before turning to see Sam sat next to him with a hood up and a scarf bundled up around his neck that covered the lower part of his face, "she was too cute I just had too."

"Kelly… Harriet," Sam mumbled, "how are they?"

"They're okay. They're happy," Luke replied to his old friend, "Harriet has been dating this guy called Grant and he's real nice, y'know? He genuinely cares about her and Kelly."

"Are you sure he treats her right?" Sam asked again for reassurance, "and Kelly, is she enjoying school?"

Luke turned his gaze away from Sam who hadn't once even looked at him, "Harriet's happy and Kelly is going about her school life the same as every other kid. She even managed to bring a bandaged arm into fashion with the girls in her class, you should have seen how proud she was about that. You don't need to worry."

Sam released a small chuckle, "I have you to thank for all of that."

"You've been watching them, haven't you?" Luke asked with pity, but Sam didn't give an answer, he didn't need to. The two of them sat silence for a moment before Luke spoke up started a tirade "What are you even doing Sam? What the hell is with this crusade of yours? Do you have any idea how many people you have hurt?" he asked as simply as he could to not draw attention from any passers-by but also with enough venom that Sam would acknowledge the question.

"I'm killing them Luke. Every single bastard who is associated with the men who ruined my life." Sam answered.

"What about  _their_  family's? You moron," Luke insulted, "can't you see that you're hurting even more people than needed just to fuel a vendetta. You didn't have to go this route. Harriet and Kelly would have stuck by you if you just revealed that you were alive!" He hissed. The Detective knew that he had gotten underneath Sam's skin as the burned man's right leg was beginning to rapidly bounce as if he was trying to find a way to calm himself down.

"Maybe…" Sam croaked a lowly whisper, "…but I can't change the road I'm going down now. You know what my plan was, and it all went wrong. I tried to backstab a bunch of people and now look at me, I'm… this…" he rumbled.

Luke gave his friend a sideways glance and asked the question he needed to know the answer too, "How?"

"Long story." Sam replied hoping to not have to explain it, but he relented when he felt his friend's eyes dig into him from afar. "Fine," he spoke, "The 'Advanced Research Group United Support' reached out to me. They learned I was dirty and that I wanted a way out from the situation I was in, so they gave me one. All I had to do was set up a meeting with the Lockers' leaders to insert some false information, which I did, and something you know about. The thing is, I was trying to play both of them thinking I could get ahead which is why I made the deal with the Lockers for you to become their new mole which I tried to back out of, but Argus wouldn't let me. They needed them to think all was fine and that I hadn't snitched…" Sam revealed.

"So where did it all go wrong?" Luke interrupted.

"The thing is, I don't know. Francis' finger slipped at the trigger and he shot me. There was no rhyme or reason to it at the time. Either he was ordered too or it was an accident, but I think he might just be a fuckin' idiot. Or,  _was_  at least," Sam joked to himself with a smirk, Luke just grimaced at his friends change of character.

"How did you survive?" The Detective then asked.

"Argus," Sam quickly answered. "When you got my family out of there they came rushing in and saved me. Fuck knows why. When I healed to this state, they gave me Deckard Francis' name and told me happy hunting," he revealed, "Maybe it's just their way of dealing with problems, to get someone else to do their dirty work so at this point I'm expecting them to send someone after me real soon."

Luke's thumb was rubbing along the button to the tracker during the entirety of this conversation, he was waiting to get the answers he wanted before he had his friend captured but after hearing everything that Sam was telling him… he moved his hand out from his pocket away from the signaller. His friend was being used and he hoped that he could help.

The arrival of Luke's train was announced through the speakers located throughout the station and the Detective knew that all the questions he wanted to ask would have to wait for another time… if there was one at all.

"Sam," Luke softly spoke, "Just stop killing innocents. I wanted to see this case through, I wanted to bring justice for my dead friend and I wanted to stop people from getting hurt. I realize now that you're not the Sam that I knew, but If you were ever truly my best friend, my partner, you'll alter the road you're on."

The train loudly entered the station and slowed to a halt in front of the two men. Sam stood up from the bench and avoided meeting his old friend's gaze, "I'll think about it," he replied before walking off into the crowd.

Luke didn't believe a single word of that reply, but he couldn't quite bring himself to press the button on that tracker. He didn't trust A.R.G.U.S and he didn't trust Sam but he still had some hope left for the Sam he knew which was something he hadn't experienced since the night he was supposed to run away with is family.


	13. Future

Nora followed her father along the streets dodging past the halted vehicles and frozen people. Her dad never usually ran the same speed as she did, he was always ahead of her, but nothing motivated her to run faster than the thought of finally catching up with him. The two speedsters very quickly halted their feet when they reached Joe's house, Barry gave Nora his triumphant smile and before he could make some snarky comment in his usual fashion his daughter cut him off, "Dad, don't…" she warned before quickly zooming up to the front door, "…Because the rules were that the winner is the first in the house!" she added before bolting straight towards the couch next to Cisco and Ralph. The bowl of chips that Ralph was munching on flew up into the air when Nora made him jump by suddenly appearing, "I'm never gonna get used to this," he said before extending his arm underneath the coffee table in front of him to pick up a chip and then brought his elongated limb back towards him allowing him to eat the dirty snack. Cisco and Nora were both wearing disgusted faces at the sight of this, "that… I'm definitely not going to get use to that," Nora cringed.

"Ralph! No extendo-arming in the house, how many times have I told you?" Cecile bossed to the Elongated Man from the kitchen. The Private Detective took a chip that landed on his chest and ate that too, "Well, Cecile, it's part of who I am," he replied with a sassy bob of his head.

Barry stood by the stairs watching the scene play out until he heard his wife's footstep begin to move down the staircase. When she reached the bottom step she smiled to her husband and planted a kiss onto his lips, "Why aren't you with the rest babe?" she asked. Barry folded his arms and shrugged, "Ah I don't… I'm just enjoying seeing Nora interact with everyone. I don't know if she ever got to experience something like this…" he sighed.

Iris pulled her husband into a hug and then kissed his forehead, "Don't dwell on this tonight, okay? And besides, some of us are meeting Nora's boyfriend for the first time so we have to make sure that stuff like this doesn't happen," Iris sighed as she pointed to Ralph scooping up the spilt chips from the floor before attempting to pour the contents into his mouth only Nora sped the dirty chips out from his hand-shovel and dropped them into the garbage can. "Nora! I wanted those!" Ralph` cried out.

"They were filthy!" Nora retaliated with a hint of laughter at Ralph's distress.

Nora's phone beeped so she hastily pulled it from the tight pockets of her jeans. Cisco and Ralph exchanged looks, both knowing that they just _had_  to give Nora's boyfriend a hard time when he arrives. How could they not?

Barry and Iris stepped into the lounge to join the others when they heard Nora's panicked voice, "He said he'll be 10 minutes! Everyone be normal, okay?!"

"Pffft we got this!" Iris said with an awkward pump of her arm.

Nora's face became expressionless, "I said 'normal' mom."

Iris looked to her husband in disbelief who laughed and began to lead her to the dining table, "Babe, I'm not embarrassing am I?" she asked him, "Like I'm totally going to at least be a cool aunt, right?" she said with a hint of fear in her voice. Barry nodded along with what she was saying, "Iris, come on. You're like the coolest person I know!"

The front door opened and Caitlin sneaked in to join the others, "Hey everyone, sorry I'm late!" she apologized. Cisco groaned, "What's late is this food!"

"Hey, I did say that dinner was going to have to be late. It's not his fault he's had a busy day." Nora replied with her hands on her hips. "Sheesh, just like your mum," Ralph said with an off-handed comment. Iris gave Ralph a dirty look and picked up one of the fake fruits and tossed it at Ralph's head.

"Sttrrrrriiike!" Cisco called out as the plastic orange bounced from the Elongated Man's flamboyant head.

Caitlin maneuvered towards Barry and gave him a quick hug and a peck on the cheek to say hello while Iris was chasing Ralph around the house, "Everyone seems rowdy today" she said to him. Barry smirked, "They're just excited, I think it's just Nora's nervousness infecting them."

When the doorbell sounded everyone froze in their spots and barely a sound was made.

"Is that him?" Iris loudly whispered from halfway up the stairs. Ralph's neck extended from the top of the staircase and his head bobbed beside Iris', "Someone get the door!" he also whispered just as loud.

Nora jogged over to the front door, hovered her hand over the handle and nodded her head towards the seating area. "Act normal, will you?!," she ordered in a hushed tone.

After the thunder of footsteps finished running to their positions Nora opened the door to see Luke standing there dressed in a casual suit with flowers in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other. The speedster greeted him with a worried and awkward smile, "Hey…" she said with an extended tone as she saw the cut on his forehead.

Barry stepped up beside Nora, smiled, and motioned Luke that he wanted to help with the flowers and wine, "Hey Luke, want me to put those down somewhere?" he asked practically taking them from the guests hands. "Yeah sure, the flowers are for Joe this time," Luke joked but soon realized that Joe wasn't there to get the reference so it fell on quiet ears.

Nora raised a finger and then motioned Luke to scoot back outside with her, "We'll be back in a second guys!" she called out to her family. When the door shut behind them, she slapped Luke's arms in frustration multiple times, "What is that on your head?!" she questioned with another slap, "You said nothing happened!"

"Hey hey hey," Luke winced during the adorably ferocious woman's strikes, "okay maybe something did happen, something big but I didn't want to say anything and ruin the night because you said these friends mean a lot to you," he replied. Nora squinted her eyes and pointed a finger close to her boyfriend's face much like Iris would do to Barry, "You're on thin ice right now mister," she warned before opening the door with a smile to her family. Nora took Luke's hand and led him into the hallway where everybody turned and stared at him.

"Hi," he said happily along with a tiny wave. Nora pointed towards him, "This is Luke."

Cisco shook his head and sipped the drink he had in his hand, "definitely Barry's daughter," he whispered to Ralph.

A sad wale of defeat sounded from the kitchen, "The turkey! My turkey!" Joe cried out.

Cecile quickly jogged out from the kitchen towards the group sat in the living area, "Hey so I kind've maybe distracted Joe, turned up the oven's heat in the process totally by accident and then burnt the turkey," she awkwardly smiled. Ralph and Cisco released an extremely audible groan, "This is Thanksgiving all over again!"

"We can always order pizza?" Nora quickly threw an idea out there.

"My beautiful bird!" Joe's voice called out again from the kitchen.

"I'll go calm him down about his precious turkey," Cecile winced, "Also hi Luke, welcome to the family!" she greeted as she quickly hugged him and then left to go back to Joe.

Iris stepped forward from the dining area and smiled to everyone, "Okay, so, Cisco you can order the food-"

"-Already on it," Cisco interrupted.

"And I'll go grab some more drinks," Ralph volunteered. "I'll come with you," Caitlin joined.

Very quickly the group split up into their roles and all that were left in the living room was Nora, Luke, Iris, and Barry.

Luke watched as everyone else scrambled and was amazed by their efficiency, it was almost as if it was a common occurrence. Barry walked alongside Iris and up to Luke, then introducing her with, "I don't think you two have officially met yet but this is Iris, my wife."

"I've heard a lot about you from Nora," Iris greeted as she reached her hand out for Luke to shake who took it softly, "You have? I hope they're nice things" he smiled a happy smile, "this is going to sound weird but this feels like I'm meeting Nora's parents for the first time."

Nora, Barry, and Iris all exchanged awkward looks before fake-laughing at Luke's joke so that he didn't suspect a thing.

"Is it true that Captain Singh loves the book Uncaged Desires?" Iris asked as he tried to steer the conversation away from the truth, but also because ever since Nora told her that Captain Singh loved "Uncaged Desires" she couldn't help but laugh every time she thought of the stern Captain of CCPD sat at home reading a raunchy romance novel. "I swear he's like the head of the fan club in this city!" Luke replied with a laugh.

"Do tell me more Detective," Iris said with intrigue as she took hold of his arm and pulled him away from the hallway and towards the couch. Luke looked over his shoulder towards Nora almost as if he was either asking for permission or asking for help, Nora only giggled at watching him experience Iris' incoming motherly interrogation.

Nora went to step forward to join her boyfriend and mother, but Barry tapped her shoulder to interrupt her movement, "I actually need to talk to you about something Nora," he said to her.

"Sure, what is it?" She asked curiously but Barry just motioned her to follow him to the porch out the front, "I'm just stealing Nora for a few minutes," he said to Iris and Luke who both just raised their thumbs as they were too engrossed in their conversation to really acknowledge him.

As they stood on the patio Barry took a seat at the top of the wooden stairs that led to the house and then patted the open space beside him. Nora took the hint and sat down beside her father, "So, what is it?"

"You can probably guess," Barry sighed, "It's about Luke."

Nora raised an eyebrow, "What about him?" she asked.

"Do you really think it's a good idea to be dating him?" He replied, "You're from thirty years in the future, and who knows what things you might change by being with him."

"I was waiting for you to bring this up," Nora groaned, "Just relax dad. I've been here for months already, nothing has changed. I'm still here."

"That's because Wally said you basically don't effect the timeline that much. But Luke? I think you might be pushing your luck with that," Barry announced in a fatherly and soft tone. Nora furrowed her brow, "what do you mean?" Nora questioned.

Barry looked away from her daughter and paused, biting his lip due to his nerves, "Listen, just… be careful with him, okay? The future is not always what it's cracked up to be. We both know that."

Nora squinted her eyes and tried her hardest to consider what her father was saying, he knew something but just what was it? She was used to him being indirect and preferring her to figure things out for herself but this time it was just different. It felt different. "Dad…" Nora mumbled as she saw the worried look on his face.

"We got the drinks!" Ralph shouted from down the street as he and Caitlin turned to walk up to the house, "And this time Ralph didn't flirt with that cashier, which is why were so quick" Caitlin added with a fake surprised voice.

"Hey, when I've got you dressed up next to me, she's bound to think I'm taken. It's all part of the seventeen-step plan," Ralph replied as they both walked up to the pair sat on the stairs. "Oh," Caitlin spoke upon noticed the expressions of Barry and Nora, "are we interrupting something?"

Barry forced a smile and stood up from the step he was sat on, "No, not at all. Let's go inside, we've left Luke with Iris." He said with a chuckle.

"Poor guy," Ralph said with pity but yelped when Nora pinched his leg as he walked past her while she remained seated.

Nora watched as Caitlin led Ralph into the house who released a "whoop whoop" upon presenting the bags of alcohol in his hands to Luke and Iris who cheered in return. Barry followed them after giving Nora that worried look of his and nodded for her to follow him in. "I'll come in in a second," she smiled, trying not to worry him further as he entered the house. She knew that her dad realized what she was thinking about. What he said. That she should be careful of Luke due to the future but there was something specific he was alluding too. Nora planted her face in the palms of her hands and groaned before tilting her head back and looking at the stars in the night sky.

The speedster climbed up to her feet from the step and moved to look through the window and into the lounge. There she saw Barry sit next to Iris and plant a kiss on her forehead while Luke laughed along with Ralph and Cisco while they handed him and Caitlin a beer. Everyone was having a great time as usual, but she noticed Luke's eyes occasionally scanning towards the front door to see when Nora would return but that's when it struck her, she had almost figured out what her father was trying to tell her. She saw Luke's eyes meet hers and she was fairly certain that he could make out the tear that she quickly wiped away from her eyes. She saw her boyfriend make an excuse to leave and got up from his seat to go to Nora. The speedster looked towards the road to hide her wiping away the wetness from her eyes. She soon heard the door creak open and felt Luke's warm arms wrap around her waist and his lips press against her cheeks, "What's wrong?" he asked as he rested his chin on the top of her head.

"I'm scared," she whispered honestly, "I'm scared that something is going to happen and that I'm going to lose you."

"Hey," he answered her with a warm voice before slowly turning her body to face his, "Do you really think I'd let that that happen?" he asked her with a cocky smirk. Luke noticed his girlfriend's lip quiver and her eyes beginning to water again, he wiped a tear that escaped her eyes with his thumb being careful not to smudge her makeup and then placed a soft kiss onto her lips. "We'll be fine, okay? I love you" he smiled to her.

Nora gave him a weak smile, looked into the green of his eyes and whispered back, "I love you too."

The front door opened once more which made both the Speedster and Detective turn to see Joe looking all worried, "are you two okay out here?" he asked the two of them who nodded in return, "good, now come and join the rest of us inside before you end up paying for the pizza," he chuckled to the both of them.

Nora and Luke followed Joe back into the West house and spent the rest of the night with everybody else having fun, eating pizza, and just simply having a great night. Throughout the night Nora could feel Barry's sad eyes when he watched her with Luke, almost as if he was expecting something bad to happen but she knew that he wouldn't say anything further on the matter, so she attempted to put it to the back of her mind and enjoy the night. Cisco and Ralph spent most of the night trying to catch Luke out and give him a rough time, but they never managed to pull anything off as he was oblivious to the teasing remarks and small pranks they made almost as if he knew what game they were playing. After the gathering ended around the very early morning of the next day Nora went back to Luke's place to spend the night with him as she did the many nights before that.

After the two of them tangled in the sheets Nora was running a finger in circles around Luke's chest while he admired her eyes which were focusing on her finger. "You're still thinking about it, aren't you?" he asked her. Nora's finger stopped, and her gaze met his, "What happened to you today?" she questioned in a calm voice.

"What happened isn't really a pillow talk conversation," he answered is a simple tone as Nora's finger began to move again. Luke sighed and pulled her closer with the arm that he had wrapped around her, "We'll talk about it tomorrow morning, I promise." Luke yawned before pressing a kiss against her forehead.

"Yeah… sure…" Nora replied as she rested her head against his chest. She led in that position feeling each breathe he took and each beat of his heart, she wasn't tired, and she couldn't fall asleep. Not when her mind was racing as fast as she could run.

Once Nora noticed that the pillow she was using had finally fallen asleep she very carefully moved his arm away from around her body and slowly moved herself out from the bed. She looked at her boyfriend fast asleep and tucked him in underneath the covers that she had messed up with her escape. Nora then moved to Luke's side of the bed and admired him for a brief moment before planting a tender and soft kiss onto his forehead, "I know I shouldn't, but I just can't help it. I need to see what he meant," she spoke to him as if she was reassuring him, but in reality, she was just saying it for herself. The speedster gave a sad smile to the sleeping detective before she felt the speedforce course through her body as she bolted through the house and into the streets of Central City. She ran as fast as her legs would carry her and eventually she entered a portal where she focused as hard as she could on the man she loved until she reached the end of the portal… and there she saw it.

Luke's future.

One where his life is only represented by a stone just like all the others that surrounded it.

" _In loving memory of Luke Brian Singh. February 14th, 1992 – January 15th, 2019. Forever missed."_


	14. Rain

When she left the portal she stumbled to a halt and there it was in front of her… a gravestone.

Nora covered her quivering lips with her hand, "No…" she croaked beneath her palm.

The gravestone read what she feared: " _In loving memory of Luke Brian Singh. February 14th, 1993 – January 15th, 2019. Forever missed."_

Nora couldn't hold the tears that were rapidly escaping her eyes. Why did this have to be him? First, she lost her dad and now she must lose Luke too? "It's no fair!" Nora stammered, "did I do this to you?" she asked the headstone with a broken voice. No, she couldn't have. This was what her father was trying to tell her to be careful about, she knew that the timeline can be altered but there are fixed events that must always happen… her father wouldn't have warned her the way he did if he knew that Luke's death could be changed.

"Excuse me, who are you?" an old yet somewhat familiar voice questioned. Nora turned to see a wrinkled sorrowful looking man walking up towards Luke's grave with flowers in one hand and an umbrella he was using as a walking stick in the other. His eyes grew wide in shock when he saw who the girl was, but what blew him away the most how she looked as young as she did the last time that he had seen her. "Nora Ognats?" he asked with a bewildered voice.

Nora managed to halt the tears and wipe away the wetness the previous ones had created, "Captain… Singh?" she said with an astounded tone.

The old retired Captain shook his head in disbelief, "I must be getting old, because you look like you haven't aged a day," he joked despite his eyesight being completely fine. "I think the last time that I saw you was at his funeral?" he asked her as he placed the bundle of flowers into a pot beside his nephew's headstone.

"I… I can't remember…." Nora mumbled as she watched Luke's Uncle move the flowers about into an assortment he liked. The Captain then ran his hand across the top of the stone and ended it with a light pat, "He always said that he didn't want to end up an old frail man. Now look at me being just that," The Captain chuckled to himself, "I don't suppose you could help me up? My knees are stiff in my old age."

Nora gave a feint pitied smile and stepped closer to Luke's grave to help his uncle up from the ground. The Captain smiled to the woman beside him and noticed the tears that had begun to run down her cheeks again, so he pulled out a handkerchief from one of his pockets and handed it to her, "Why are you here Nora?" he asked her.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," she replied as she dabbed the wetness below her eyes with the cloth.

"Yeah, you're probably right. You speedsters really confuse me," he answered. Nora didn't have any more room for the shock that that sentence should have triggered in her, "how did you know?" she asked him.

"Barry Allen, your father, was the Flash. I always knew even though he thought I didn't, it's why I was always so lenient with him," The Captain smiled as his mind went down memory lane, "And when he introduced you to me when you were a toddler the familiarity was there and it all eventually added up in this old brain of mine. Time travel, right? I read in the flash museum that he was capable of it, or maybe I'm just a good detective."

Nora released an actual smile this time, "and Luke is… such a bad one," she joked, and David laughed along with her. "Yeah… he certainly wasn't the best." He ended with a sigh.

The two of them stood there in silence for a few moments when they began to feel rain starting to spit down onto them, but they didn't seem to care.

"If you could go back in time to stop his death, even if it could have consequences, would you do it?" Nora spoke up as her eyes stayed on where Luke's name was chipped into the stone.

David pondered for a moment before shaking his head, "No. I wouldn't."

Nora's eyes darted to the man beside her. She was relying on him to enforce what she wanted to do, she didn't want this to be Luke's future so why wouldn't his uncle want him saved? She wanted his permission.

"Why not?" She asked him with a hint of anger at his reply.

"Because Luke wouldn't want other people to get hurt for his life to be saved. It's not the kind of person he is, and you know why. So, when you say 'consequences'… well, what do you think he would say?" David answered with a knowing voice. Nora's however couldn't escape her mouth and her lips began to quiver slightly once more. David wrapped an arm around her and pulled her into a hug, "You know he was a stubborn person Nora, I'm sure you experienced that first hand. There are some things you can't change no matter how much you want them to," he said to her as she began to cry in his arms.

"Why did I have to fall in love with someone like him?" She stammered against the old man's chest.

"Because he fell in love with you," The Captain answered as tears began to flow from him too. One of Nora's hands bundled a part of the captain's coat into her grip as she heard David's reply, it broke her and she cried into his chest.

The rain began to pour harder and you could hear the raindrops bounce from the petals of the flowers beside the grave. David opened his umbrella and held it above him and Nora, "You'd think rain would avoid cemeteries, they're already sad enough," he spoke, trying to take Nora's mind from the loss by reciting a sentence from his favourite book.

Nora pulled herself form David's arms and wiped her wet cheeks, "Luke liked the rain," she replied to him.

"He did?" The Captain asked with a curious look, even after all these years he was still learning new things about his nephew.

Nora release a small laugh alongside her tears, "one time he dragged me out from his bed and pulled me outside when he heard the rain against his window."

"Why did he do that?" The old man asked, curiosity on his face. "Because I told him the week before that I always wanted to kiss somebody in the pouring rain… like in one of those romantic movies," she answered with a little bit of a cringe.

David began to laugh and so did Nora to the point where they didn't even notice the sound of the water around them.

"You two were such the pair," The Captain spoke as he looked back at the stone beside them. He then released a heavy sigh and looked down at the short woman beside him, "I don't know if it's possible, but if you can… If you can then please save him."

Nora gave him a wide-eyed look before speaking again; "I'm not going to let this be his future."

Before the Captain could reply again a red streak bolted past him, and Nora disappeared.

"What do you think you're doing?!" Barry shouted to his daughter as he returned the both of them to STAR Labs in the year 2018.

"What do you think?" Nora shouted back to him, "I was getting answers for what you wouldn't tell me!"

Barry sighed and ran one of his gloved hands down his face, "Nora you can't just go and find out when people die, you can't change it. You shouldn't."

"Oh, I can't? That's rich coming from you. You saved mom from Savitar!" Nora snapped back.

"That's different," Barry replied, "it wasn't set in stone."

Nora grimaced at her father, walked up to him, and pushed him before bolting out of STAR Labs and back to her sleeping boyfriend. Who the hell was her father to lecture her about the timeline, and about who she can and cannot save. She's a superhero, it's in her job description to save the people she loves.

The speedster stopped in front of the entrance to her boyfriend's house and then entered the living room where she saw David and Rob sitting at the kitchen's island eating a small breakfast and drinking their morning coffee, "Good morning Nora," Rob greeted with a smile as he sipped on his drink. "Luke didn't do anything stupid last night did he?" David asked with a full mouth after biting into his bagel, Rob slapped his husbands arm upon noticing him speak with his mouth full.

Nora once again wiped her eyes but did so by pretending she had something in them and smiled to the men in front of her, "Yeah, no, it was a great night. Everyone loved him," she smiled forcefully. "Is he still asleep?" she then asked as she began to walk towards the stairs.

"I think he's awake but let him know that breakfast is on the table, I'm ready whenever he is!" Rob called out as Nora jogged up the stairs, "will do!" she replied not really paying attention to what he had said.

Nora moved her hand towards her boyfriend's bedroom door, but it hovered for a few moments as she looked through the open space. Luke was sat on the edge of his bed fully dressed and wearing a worried expression on his face as he fiddled with a silver piece of metal. Nora couldn't wait a moment longer to hold him, so she pushed the door open and walked straight towards the man she loved. "Oh hey!" Luke chimed as he quickly hid the metal he was playing with in the drawer beside the bed, "where'd you go?" he then asked.

Luke got no answer and instead was slowly pushed to his back as Nora climbed on top of him on the bed. The speedster looked into his eyes as she hovered on top of him, "I love you," she stated with as much truth as she could put into those three words. Luke released a warm smile, "and I love you too. Possibly even more than you love me. Which must be totally difficult, right?"

Nora collapsed onto her boyfriend's chest forcing her boyfriend to release a groan of slight pain, "what's the matter?" Luke asked as he wrapped his arms around his girlfriend.

"You said you would tell me what happened to you yesterday, so tell me," she said, emotionless.

"I… Uhm… Sam's alive," Luke stammered as he tried to explain what happened in the quickest way possible. Luke felt his girlfriend nuzzle her head into his chest to signal that she wanted to hear more. "He's the one who gave me the cut on my forehead. He apologized though… well he didn't actually apologize but he came and spoke to me before I left on the train back," The detective revealed, but he tried to keep the details of A.R.G.U.S to himself as he didn't want Nora to worry more than she already was.

Nora moved her head from Luke's chest while she remained on top of him still, "he what?" she asked him, "you spoke to him? Is he the man who tried to burn you alive?"

"Oh… Uh… Yes? Maybe? When you put it like that maybe I should have arrested him," Luke mumbled to himself.

"MAYBE?!" Nora shouted as she pushed herself from his chest and left the bed, "of course you fucking should have!"

Luke's eyes widened, "Did you just… swear?" he asked in a shocked voice and a slight smirk.

Nora scowled and clenched her fists, "this isn't funny Luke! You don't know what he's capable of doing!" she shouted again.

The detective sat up the bed and frowned, "oh,  _I_  don't know what  _he's_  capable of? Do you even know what I've been doing for the last few years?"

"Nothing of use clearly if you think the man who tried to kill you twice, maybe three times, is still your friend." She hissed.

"It's more like four," Luke sighed and ran one of his hands down his face, "listen, it's hard to explain…" he answered her, trying not to fuel the argument. Nora simply crossed her arms and tilted her head as she expected him to explain. "Fine," Luke spoke, "I went to see Harriet and Kelly before I came back, and that's what he asked me about. He took a seat right next to me at the train station and asked me how his family was doing, if his wife was happy with her new man and if Kelly was having fun at school. Now tell me that  _that_ isn't a man who can't be saved!" Luke ranted. He knew that if he told her what had really happened, that Sam had burst into the building he was in and killed Deckard and assaulted Luke… She'd want him to stop following the case. He just couldn't do that.

Nora's lips quivered, and the tears began to flow once more. Her legs grew weak and she collapsed, quickly took hold of her and held her up before she could hit the ground. Nora began to release all of the emotion that she had pent up and held Luke as tightly as she possible could. Luke slowly sat the two of them on the ground as she soaked Luke's shoulder, he didn't know what part of what he said had made her cry.

"I don't want you to die," Nora croaked into her boyfriend shoulder, "I don't want to lose someone again."

"Hey…" Luke whispered as he rocked her slowly in his arms, "I'm not going to die, okay?"

"How do you know?" Nora trembled.

"Because," Luke answered as he reached one of his arms into the draw to pull out the metal he had been fiddling around with before Nora entered the bedroom, "you're going to need someone to help carry your things into our new apartment."

It took a few seconds for Nora to process what her boyfriend had just said. She slowly released herself from the hug and looked at the happy smile Luke had on his face and then looked down towards the fingers that held a silver key. The speedster slowly released a weak smile, "R-really?" she stammered, "you're not joking, are you?"

Luke raised his hand so that the key was now placed in front of both of their faces so that it was the only thing Nora could focus on, "I'm being one hundred percent serious," Luke answered, "Nora Ognats, will you move in with me?" he then grinned.

"On two conditions," Nora said sternly as she moved the key away from her gaze.

"Which are?"

Nora took a moment to muster up the courage before telling Luke what she needed from him, "The first is that you have to promise to stop following the arson case- "

"- But Nora," Luke interrupted, "You know how much work I've put into it, and how much it means to me." Luke objected but as he looked into the sad eyes of the love in his arms, he realized what meant so much more to him… her. "Please Luke… please. For me." Nora begged into his chest. The Detective relented, released a sigh and then a smile as he lifted up her chin with one of his fingers, "I promise," he answered before he met his lips with hers.

"And the second condition?" Luke then asked.

Nora smirked, "You cook me pancakes every morning for a week!"

Luke Laughed at the request before slowly nodding, "I guess I can do that," he sarcastically replied before he slowly raised the key back up towards Nora's face

Nora released a single outburst of a laugh and then squealed as she ripped the key from Luke's fingers and began to shower him with kisses. "Then yes! Yes I will move in with you!" she cheered before planting one long and passionate kiss onto his lips.

"Great!" Luke replied, "Because we're moving in today," he revealed.

"We're… we're what?" Nora questioned with shock.

Luke ruffled her messy, bedhead hair and grinned, "We're moving in today," he repeated, "Rob's got a van outside for my stuff and then we can go and get yours!" he cheered.

Nora began to laugh at her boyfriend once more, "you sure like to rush things, don't you?"

Luke shrugged and quickly pecked her lips, "Only when it comes to you."

"In that case…. when am I getting my engagement ring?" Nora teased with a raised eyebrow and a smirk. Luke's eyes widened and then he began to laugh at Nora's joke, "Nice one, that's good. Real funny Nora," Luke laughed nervously but Nora turned her expression serious. "I'm not joking," she replied.

"You're… you're not?" Luke gulped.

Nora winked and pressed her lips against his once more.

"Of course I'm joking! I'm a fast mover but not that fast," she giggled as she climbed up from the floor.

"Oh thank god," Luke mumbled with a sigh of relief. "I should probably go and tell Rob that I'm packing my stuff up now, we should be good to go in an hour or so, is that alright?" he asked Nora who simply smiled and nodded.

"Wait, why didn't you pack up your stuff earlier?!" She called out to him as she watched Luke leave the room. "Because it wouldn't be much of a surprise then would it?" He shouted down from the hallway.

Nora chuckled to herself as she fell backwards onto the bed with her body spread out.

"I'll save you Luke. I promise that I'll save you no matter what."


	15. Pancakes

"Oh, so you're treating me to pancakes… in the evening?" Nora questioned as she held back her laughter. Her and Luke had spent the last week and a half living in their new apartment living their lives as a normal couple, well, as normal as their lives would allow. The two of them would sporadically leave to do their jobs every now and then when they weren't on the clock, so they didn't get much chance for a downtime, or even share a dinner that often. So, Luke had decided to treat her to one of the few things that he could actually cook.

"Well I owe you a weeks' worth of pancakes though, right? You barely eat when you're here as it is" Luke sighed with concern. But Nora couldn't just tell him that she needs to eat a mountain of food to satisfy her hunger, so she would usually eat at STAR Labs to avoid that conversation.

Nora walked further into their kitchen and stood on her tiptoes to plant a kiss onto one of her boyfriends' cheeks, "I eat enough, don't worry so much," she smiled before walking to the small table behind Luke. She took a seat and admired him while he cooked for her.

"You have the cutest butt you know," Nora teased. Luke simply paused and looked over his shoulder before winking and then beginning to laugh in embarrassment, "You really need to stop. I thought you were supposed to be the cute and adorable one? Not the teasing one, because that's my thing"

"I  _am_  the cute and adorable one, but I can tease too!" She replied laughing along with him.

Nora saw Luke's sudden excitement and heard his giggle as he stood back with the pan in his hands, "Are you ready?" he questioned, "I'm going for the penta-spin!"

The speedster feigned shock, "The penta-spin? But Luke! Nobody has ever pulled that off before!"

Luke shook his head at Nora in a playful way because he couldn't keep up with the pretending when it came to her. Luke motioned the pan forward and back three times before flinging the pancake into the air… one spin… two spins… "I'm going to do it!" Luke cheered…. Three spins… four…

_**Splat.** _

"Goddammit."

"Do you think it's stuck there?" Nora said with bewilderment.

Luke and Nora paused as they watched to see if the pancake would fall from the ceiling. It wasn't moving. The two of them turned their gaze to the other and they began to howl with laughter.

"You go and take that down from there, I'll make us some food," Nora said as she wiped a happy tear from her eyes after their laughter had died down.

It took a while, but Luke eventually managed to struggle the pancake from the ceiling while Nora cooked them a proper meal for the evening. They spent the rest of the night after dinner sat on the couch watching movies underneath the warmth of a blanket. Within halfway through the first movie Nora had fallen asleep on top of Luke and he thought he would let her catch up on her lack of sleep while he watched the film he had chosen for them, although he didn't know if he should be insulted by Nora falling asleep while they watched his favorite film, "Mr Detective: Battle For Planet Flytoid"… maybe the plot was a bit too convoluted but that was it's charm, to Luke it was anyway.

As one of the tensest scenes of the film began Luke's phone vibrated next to him which he quickly picked up so that it didn't wake his girlfriend. His phone lit with a message from an unknown number, "Meet me on the roof," and he realized who it was right away. Luke couldn't go, he knew that. He promised Nora that he would drop the case for both their sakes, and he'd rather be sat with Nora in his arms than out there in danger.

But he wasn't a quitter. He couldn't just drop something he had been working on and if he could help save lives, even if it is just one then you'd be damn sure he'd put his own on the line. So, he needed to see what Sam wanted.

The Detective slowly and very gently shifted himself out from Nora's embraced and carefully led her down on the couch. He then grabbed the nearest piece of paper and wrote down that he was quickly going out to get some snacks and then placed it onto the coffee table, pausing the movie afterwards. He didn't want to miss anything. He then got changed from his comfy clothes, grabbed his pistol and made his way to the roof of the apartment complex.

Once he opened the door and stepped into the night, he saw the silhouette of a man at the edge of the roof. When the man turned around to face Luke the city lights illuminated his burned and melted face.

"I was going to knock on your door if you didn't come in five minutes," Sam spoke.

"What do you want Sam? I told you I was done with this." Luke replied with a stone-cold voice.

Sam smirked as much as he could and then shook his head, "You never said that, don't get things mixed up Luke. You said you wanted me to change my ways, so help me."

"You've got to be joking…" Luke sighed.

Sam stepped forward to his old partner and held out an open hand to him, "It's a two-man job, we can do it your way, no killing. We capture him and call the cops, if it works out then I'll stop killing them. I'll become like one of those vigilantes in Star City." He said with a slight of humor

"You know I don't trust you, right?" Luke questioned, but Sam simply acknowledged what he said with a quick head tilt toward his hand.

"Fine," Luke replied shaking Sam's hand, "But if I so much as think you're going to pull some crafty shit, I'm going to arrest you."

"You ready then? We're going to need your car," Sam said with a hint of excitement as he headed towards the stairs. Luke span around with worry, "We're going now? But it's movie night, my girlfriend is sleeping!"

"Don't worry your pretty little head about it Singh, we'll be gone two to three hours max. If we don't get caught that is, just hope that she doesn't wake up" the arsonist smiled as he held the door open for Luke to walk through.

Luke groaned as he relented to Sam's old ways of peer pressuring him and headed towards the open door.

"I always knew you were going to be the death of me."


	16. The Beat Cops

He was already regretting being here for a multitude of reasons, for one he would much rather be cuddled up beside Nora, and for two he knew this was a bad idea, but he had to be a part of this. There was that thought at the back of his mind that just kept on nagging at him to see it through.

"You're pulling that stupid face of yours again," the melted man spoke as he looked through the binoculars. "How do you know? You've been looking through that for over twenty minutes," Luke sighed, "Can't we just call this a bust so I can go home?"

Sam removed his gaze from the lenses for the first time in a while and raised his only eyebrow to his old partner, "No, we can't."

"Well can you at least tell me what's so important about me being here?" The Detective questioned in frustration as he checked his phone for any messages from Nora.

"You're here because stakeouts are boring on your own," Sam replied, "and if this douchebag we're waiting for shows up then I'm going to need your help."

Luke's stomach dropped, he knew what Sam meant and he grew angry with him that he didn't explain this beforehand, "I did not fucking sign up for a shootout Sam. I can't go back all bloody and bruised. I won't do it. I promised her."

"And yet here you are," the burned man said in a smug tone as he looked back through the binoculars. Luke grew irritated and slapped them from Sam's grip, "What do you mean by that?" he snapped.

Sam began to laugh, "Oh come on Luke, we both know you have two addictions. Your first one is your guilt over me. The second is doing the complete opposite of what you're supposed to do. If you weren't a cop, you'd be one hell of a crook."

As Luke was about to retaliate, he noticed Sam's eyes widen as he noticed something in the distance. The burned man lifted his hood over his head and stepped out of the door, heading straight towards the warehouse they had been watching without a word. In confusion Luke opened the door and watched his partner walk with haste towards danger, "where are you going?" he called out, but he got no response. "Damn it," he whispered to himself before stepping out of the car and running up towards his old friend.

"You don't need to be here for this part," Sam told him, "this is going to be a mess."

"You need to stop, right now," Luke called out, "I know what you're going to do."

The burned man stopped in his tracks and paused for a moment before drawing his pistol and pointing it towards Luke, "This really was just going to be a stakeout Singh, but the guy who ordered the hit on me is in there, and I won't let you stop me."

The Detective stood there with his hands raised thinking of what to do next. He could let his friend go into that warehouse alone and most likely get killed, or he can stop him right now and save some lives of those criminals Sam intends to kill.

"I'm sorry," Luke apologized.

"For what?" Sam questioned as his eyes looked towards Luke no longer through the sights of his weapon.

"I didn't save you that night, I fucked it all up for you and your family," the Detective croaked, "I would have done it if you asked of me, I would have taken the deal."

Sam lowered his weapon and quickly wiped a tear away that had formed. "I didn't ask because I didn't trust you enough. You do know that, right?"

Luke released a pained laugh, "Yeah… I know."

"And yet here you are."

"And yet here I am."

The two of them stared at each other for a few seconds but to both of them it felt like a lifetime, neither one nor the other knew what they were about to do. Soon enough Sam raised aimed his sights back towards Luke, "Leave. This is your only chance."

The Detective shook his head, "I'm not abandoning you again Sam."

"Leave!" The melted man roared as he took a few steps forward attempting to intimidate his friend, but the cop remained as still as a statue.

"No."

Sam's hand began to shake as it held the metal in his hands, his finger began to swell on the trigger and when he was about to pull it, he saw the glow of distant lights appear on Luke's face. The Arsonist turned around to see that those he was there to kill were beginning to leave, most likely due to the roar of his voice.

"I'm sorry that I have to do this," Luke spoke with a sadness in his voice which was followed by a beeping sound. The Arsonist grew angry at the sound, he knew what it was because Argus had given him the same device when he was asked to deal with the Lockers.

"You have no idea what you've done!" The melted man roared as he swung his body around to take a shot at Luke but he was met with Luke's fist that forced him to the ground and releasing his weapon from his hand, as it hit the cold stone beneath them it released a gunshot into the air.

The Detective pulled his pistol from its holster and aimed it towards his old friend, "I've stopped your killing. That's what I've done."

Sam began to laughed, "Oh man, you really believe that don't you? You're incapable of saving lives."

"Shut up!" Luke shouted, "For once in your life stop trying to get the last word!"

The Arsonist smiled, "I don't need words, just count to three."

"No… no no no, what have you done?!" Luke questioned but as he finished speaking the warehouse in the distance exploded in a blaze of heat and the screams could be heard as if they were right next to him.

"Why?..." the Detective whispered, "why did you bring me here?"

The Arsonist wiped blood from where his lip would be and began to climb to his feet, "because I wanted you to see how worthless you are. You were my best friend, my brother… and you just left me there to burn. You don't deserve closure, and you certainly don't deserve the life that you stole from me!" he roared his final words as he charged forwards towards the frozen man in front of him tackling him to the stone beneath and began to strike him again and again and again. Each punch more powerful than the last but the Detective just led there and took each one as if it were nothing, as if he deserved it.

"Fight back!" Sam shouted as he pulled on the collar of Luke's shirt and punched him in the nose with a crack.

"Do it… take my life if that's what you need," Luke stammered as red poured from his mouth, "see how the guilt of killing your friend makes you anything but happy."

His vision had blurred after the attack, he couldn't tell if he was just dazed or if Sam had messed up one of his eyes, but it was all the same. It didn't matter where his friend had struck him because the end result was coming. He was told he didn't deserve closure but that's what he was getting, one way or another the end was coming, and that's all he was waiting for right now. The final blow.

His thoughts were slow, in fact he wasn't really thinking at all. He wasn't remembering anything but images of the people he loves. His mother, Harriet and Kelly, Sam before the accident, and Nora. Since he met her it was always her.

Luke felt a few warm drops of liquid land on his bloodied face and then multiple cold droplets. It had begun to rain but he knew the warm drops were tears, tears of a man with regret and loss.

The light of the inferno in the distance disappeared and the weight on his body shifted as Sam climbed up from him with his heavy footsteps crawling into the distance as the quickly formed puddles splashed under his feet.

Luke led there as his body became drenched from the storm, he couldn't move. Not because his body wouldn't let him, but he just couldn't… he truly could not bring himself to move himself from the ground. He didn't know if it was over, if it was all finally over and that Sam had decided to walk a different path.

This was anything but closure.

He expected his eyes to shut at this point, what he didn't expect was to see a flash of purple and yellow appear beside him.

The woman of the pair fell to her knees and began to cry as she held Luke in her arms. "You're okay, you're going to be okay. Say something," she begged as she placed her forehead against his, but he couldn't reply to the muffled voices that he heard.

"Come on, say something," she begged again as she placed a gloved hand against one of his bloodied and bruised cheeks.

"XS we have to get him to a hospital," The Flash spoke to her.

"Look at him! If we move him he could die" She screamed back to her partner, "Get Cisco to bring Caitlin here!"

Luke's eyes moved to look at the woman who cradled him even if they couldn't focus. "Nora…" he managed to croak much to the speedsters shock, "…tell her I'm sorry."

"But it's too soon, you can't die!" Nora croaked, barely forming her words.

Barry looked away from his daughter's heartbreak and radioed into the cortex, ordering Caitlin to arrive. He knew why this was happening, Nora's discovery and life in the past had led the timeline to changing for Luke but not for the better.

Luke looked into the eyes of the woman who ripped off the mask from her face, he didn't feel any shock or betrayal at the secret she kept from him. He was just happy that she was here right now. "Don't speak, and try not to move okay baby?" Nora voiced in a warm tone, "everything's going to be okay." She added trying to convince herself more than her boyfriend before she looked over her shoulder to her father, "Where's Caitlin?!" she cried out to him.

"She's on her way, just get him to hang on a few seconds more," he said to her in a calm manner, trying to keep his composure.

"Nora," Luke whispered with blood escaping from his mouth.

"Hush, don't speak," Nora replied, "Just keep focusing on me okay? Don't look away, I'm here," she begged.

"I'm…sorry..."


	17. Aftermath

"So you're good to go and see her?"

"Yeah sweetie I'm literally on my way right now, just gotta hope someone lets me in."

"Thanks Iris, she hates me right now but I'm sure you'll get through to Nora."

"You do remember that she hated me at the start too, right? Everything will be fine Barry, I've been what she's been through. She just needs time and help."

"You're probably right… and Iris?"

"Yeah?"

"I love you. So damn much."

"I love you too. I'll speak to you later babe, I'll call you after I've seen her."

The two parents ended their conversation with a goodbye and Iris slid her phone into a pocket of her coat. It had been two weeks since Luke's death and Nora was avoiding absolutely everyone, not even Joe could get through to her. Iris didn't blame her though, everyone deals with grief their own way but she couldn't just let Nora rot in her apartment all alone.

Iris stepped up to the metal keypad and buzzed Nora's apartment but there was no answer. She tried three more times before giving up and buzzing one of her neighbors.

"Who is it?" a voice crackled from the other side.

"Hi, I'm just trying to see my friend but she isn't answering, could you let me in please?" Iris asked in a friendly tone.

The crackled voice didn't reply but instead a buzz sounded and the door to the building unlocked, "Yes!" Iris triumphantly muttered to herself before opening the door and walking into the building towards her daughter's apartment. When she arrived at her destination, she raised her hand and knocked gently on the door, again, no reply from Nora.

"Nora sweetie, it's me," Iris spoke with a gentle voice, "I've come to see if you're okay."

No reply.

Iris sighed, "I didn't want to have to be  _that_ kind of mom, but you leave me no choice."

The reporter reached into her bag and pulled out the lock picking set she stole from Ralph earlier should she need to do exactly what she was doing right now, picking the lock to Nora's apartment. Within a few moments of fiddling the lock clicked and the door slowly moved open and Iris stepped into the home, "Nora, it's your mom," she called out again, "where are you?" she asked into the open. As she walked through the small hallway, she was met with a disgustingly filthy apartment with takeaway food rotting within it's packaging scattered across the area. Iris grimaced at the sight of the mountain of filth on the couch.

"Damn it Nora I didn't think things were this bad…" she muttered to herself as she stepped over the scattered junk.

The mountain on the couch began to move and collapsed onto the ground as Nora appeared from underneath a dark blue blanket. Iris caught the gaze of the pale woman with bags under her eyes and unkempt hair as she sat up, "and here comes the mother of the century," Nora groaned before falling back to lie on the couch once more.

"Right, here's what we're going to" Iris began with a motherly tone, "you are going to shower and clean yourself up while I begin to try and tackle this mess. You can come and help me after you've tidied yourself up."

"Go away mom, I don't want you here," Nora replied in a very dismissive tone.

Iris frowned, "Well I'm not going anywhere. I know what you're going through and wallowing in self-pity won't get you anywhere and having this mess around you certainly won't help you" she replied. In an instant an empty bottle of whisky flew past Iris' face and smashed against the wall behind her, Nora had thrown it in anger.

"You have no idea what I'm going through you self-centered bitch!" Nora screamed.

Iris stood rooted in place, stunned at the actions of her usually sweet and caring daughter. "You're drinking now? You can't even get drunk," she said bewildered.

"I can't and it's unfair. Everyone else gets to have an escape from their shit but not me. Now leave me be." Nora muttered as she avoided meeting her gaze with her mothers.

Iris dropped her bag to the ground and stepped forward towards her daughter who remained still when her mother wrapped her arms around her as tight as she could, "I'm so sorry… for everything that has happened," she whispered, "I know I haven't been the best mom, and I know I never paid much attention to your relationship with him… but I really am sorry for everything that you're going through."

Nora tried to hold back the floodgates of her tears but it didn't last long at all, she embraced her mother and wailed into the shoulder of her coat. Iris began to cry along side her as she patted her hair and repeatedly whispered that it's okay.

"How did you do it mom?" Nora stammered, "how did you get past Eddie's death?"

Iris' heart stopped for a moment upon hearing her daughters question, she didn't have a reply that she wanted Nora to hear but she deserved the truth.

"I haven't, and I don't think I ever will."

Nora pulled her head from her mothers damp shoulder and looked at her quizzically, "why?" she asked.

Iris sighed and then turned around and moved the junk from the couch onto the floor and then sat the herself down beside Nora. "I loved him, like you love Luke… and when Eddie died I didn't know what to do with myself, who to talk to, or where to go. There was no escaping that sense of loss and it never goes away… so you just learn to live with it."

Nora watched her mother open up about what she had experienced and she felt sorry for her but at the same time she was amazed by her strength. Her mother had never opened up to her like this before so to hear her talk like this now… she gets to see her vulnerable for once. "I'm not as strong as you or dad, I haven't lost as many people. Moving on and living with it… it seems so difficult," Nora stammered.

Iris moved and arm around Nora's shoulder and pulled her in, resting their heads against each other after words, "It is hard Nora, it's one of the hardest things you will ever do. It get's easier though, every day it gets a little easier until you can look back and smile about it. So, tell me a memory you have with him, a happy one."

Nora paused for a moment and thought long and hard about the many stupid things that she and Luke had done together but her mind kept wandering back to those final moments. The moments where his face was cut, bloodied, and bruised. The moments where she looked into his eyes and saw that he wasn't ready to go. He didn't want to. That memory faded away when she remembered the two of them led next two each other after their first day in Keystone. The day where everything began to go wrong but right all at the same time.

"Every time he told me he loved me… they are the happiest memories I have of him," Nora croaked… but then she released a chuckle and wiped a way a tear that dropped down her cheek. "... But one time we were walking down the street and a little boy saw his badge and pointed at him and said: 'look mommy, a sherlock!' and Luke smiled at the boys and brushed his mothers apology off when she said sorry for the hindrance. Luke just knelt in front of the boy and let him hold his badge and answered any questions the boy had. It was the cutest thing," Nora smiled.

"Oh wow," Iris chuckled, "I would have proposed there and then."

Nora released a genuine laugh this time, "I would have… but a bird pooped right on his shoulder."

"You're joking!" Iris laughed in surprise.

"No, not at all!" Nora continued to laugh, "He released such a loud groan and turned to me with the most serious expression and then said 'I bought this yesterday.' with the most upset voice!"

The two women continued to laugh for a few moments more and Iris couldn't be any happier than she was at the moment to see her daughter smiling which she was sure Nora hadn't done since Luke's death. When the mood became somber once more it was cut off again by the sound of an envelope dropping through the door and into the apartment. Iris looked towards the doorway and got up to retrieve it when she saw that Nora had no intention of moving.

Once the reporter picked it up, she saw the envelope simply had 'Nora' written onto it. "Nora?" she called over to her daughter, "You might want to read this."

Nora sighed before slowly getting up from the couch and walking towards her mother who extended her arm out for her to take it quicker. The woman from the future glanced at the writing to see if it looked familiar but she had never seen it before so she flipped it over in her hands and opened it to find piece of paper folded three times.

_"To Nora Allen-West,_

_First of all, I am truly truly sorry for what I have done-"_

"He's here!" Nora spoke aloud to herself before bolting out of her and Luke's… her apartment.

Iris stood there for a few seconds in silence before picking up the letter from the floor and reading it.

_"To Nora West-Allen,_

_First of all, I am truly, truly sorry for what I have done._

_I will admit that I had every intention of killing Luke that night. I wanted him to suffer like I had suffered. I wanted him to know what true helplessness feels like. I was going to bring us into the building that you and The Flash extinguished, and I was going to have the two of us be in that fire with those low-life pieces of shit that planned my downfall. But multiple times that night Luke pulled me back from those thoughts and I saw flickers of my past. It was almost like I wasn't this disgusting melted monster anymore… and I was just Sam again._

_That final punch? I have regretted it every single day and I'm sure that this feeling will be with me until a last breath of my own. In the end, I didn't mean to kill him. I didn't want to kill him. That final punch was out of anger because he still believed in me, after everything I had done… but that's the kind of man he is, isn't he? He'll always be that dumb ass you can't help but love. It's probably why you were so smitten with him._

_I don't know why I have written this letter to you, maybe it is me trying to clear my conscience, even just a little bit but I know I'll get no forgiveness from you._

_My life is going to be different from now on. I'm stopping this quest of mine and I'm going to try and live my life as best as I can because that is what Luke wanted for me. I don't deserve it, you and I can agree on that, but I'm doing this for Luke._

_I'm sorry Nora. I'm sorry for taking him from you._

_Sam."_

Iris read the final words and placed it on the side of the kitchen table. Nora appeared in a flash of purple and yellow with anger on her face, "He got away!" she shouted as she punched the wall behind her with such force that it went straight through, "I couldn't find him! He was right here and I couldn't find him!" She shouted again.

Iris let her daughter release her frustration before speaking again, "It probably wasn't even him who posted it, don't get so angry about this."

Nora took some deep breaths before rubbing her forehead in frustration. "The nerve of him thinking that he can just go and start a new life, he thinks that  _that_  is what Luke wanted for him!" Nora seethed.

"Well, is it?" Iris questioned.

Nora angrily bit her lip, "He's dead, we'll never know will we?" she lied.

Iris released a small sigh before nodding a no, agreeing with her.

"I'm going to find that murderer, and he's going to face justice."


	18. Picture

She could feel it inside her as she sat opposite the stone. The guilt over not being able to save the person that she wanted to protect most. She found it funny how one of the reasons that she came back to the past was to try and change her father's disappearance, yet she ended up falling in love and ending up in a near same situation with someone else. It wasn't funny at all really, but Nora knew that Luke would tease her for it by telling her that she needs to sort out her priorities or that they were clearly destined to be together in some sappy rom-com way. It was always the flip of a coin when it came to him, and that's one of the reasons that she loved him. It's also one of the things she hated most. If he had just stuck to his promise of leaving the Arson case alone then he wouldn't be buried underground in front of her. She hated him for it, because he didn't trust her and leave well-enough alone.

Nora sighed as her thoughts ran rampant through her mind, she stood up and meekly lifted a hand in front of her waiting for rain to begin but it never came. She noticed recently that Central City was getting much colder, or that it had been cold for quite a while, but she only started to feel it a few days ago. Nora took a few steps to stand beside Luke's grave and placed the flowers she had just purchased beside the many others that surrounded the stone. She looked at variety of buds and petals and released a weak smile, it warmed her heart a little to know that people cared.

Nora sighed when she heard footsteps crunch the frosted grass behind her.

"I thought I'd find you here," her father spoke.

Nora simply remained silent and kept her gaze on the flowers.

Barry slowly stepped beside her and stood in silence. A few minutes passed before he spoke again. "I'm sorry Nora. I really am," he whispered.

Nora looked at her father and then back to the grave.

"I don't want you to hate me. I know how angry you feel, I really do. When my father…" Barry's lip quivered a little and Nora's gaze hesitantly turned to her father, "…when my father died there was nothing more that I wanted to do than put my hand through Zooms chest. I know what it's like to want to hurt someone who's wronged you… and I've had so much of that in my life."

"Reverse Flash…" Nora mumbled to him in a curious tone.

"Especially him."

Nora paused for a moment and looked towards one of the pictures placed near the centre of the flowers. It was a laminated picture of Luke during a picnic with Harriet and Kelly, the little girl was jumping on Luke's back in the picture and Harriet look surprised yet happy. "If you understand all of that, then why did you stop me from going back to change it. I can save him if you'd just let me."

Barry sighed and shook his head, "we've been over this so many times Nora, I don't know how to get it into your head that it just can't be done. It's a fixed point in time, he has to die. Even the Legends have said it."

Nora laughed in disbelief, "The Legends created a Voltron teddy bear to fight a demon. I'm sorry if I choose not to believe everything they say regarding time when they consistently mess it up somehow."

Before Barry could reply to her, Nora kneeled and carefully picked up the picture that she had previously been looking at. She looked at Luke's wide smile before standing back up and walking past her father, "I have somewhere to be."

"Nora, wait. We're not done yet," Barry called out as she walked down the slow incline towards the exit of the cemetery.

"We're done dad. I won't go back in time, I promise," Nora replied as she walked away, "but I will lock the bastard up who killed him."

Nora took a few panicked breaths as she walked away from Barry, she wasn't mentally prepared to talk about everything that has happened just yet. He was there with her when Luke died in her arms, he should have been the one to support her, but he simply pushed her away. It almost felt like he was monitoring her. She was so angry with him because of that, how could her own father treat her as though she's the one who messed up. The first time that Nora entered the speedforce to try and change Luke's fate her own father was there in an instant to stop her. She understood his reasons, but to her, her anger is justified.

As she left her fathers field of view Nora looked at the picture one more time before putting one foot in front of the other and bolting forwards as fast as her feet could carry her and within a few moments she was stood before a door with her nerves rattling inside her chest. She raised a closed fist towards the door, paused for a few moments, and then lowered it to walk away.

"Can I help you?" A soft voice spoke from the staircase that was placed a few doors down from the apartment Nora stood before. The speedster turned to see a blonde woman dressed in comfy looking clothes along with a tired look on her face with dark bags under her eyes. The woman's eyes widened when she saw who was stood in front of her apartment, "Nora?" she asked, still in a soft tone but this time with sadness along with it.

Nora gave Harriet an empathetic smile. If anybody had any idea what she was going through herself, it would be the woman who Luke has cared for over the years.

"Do you want to come in?" Harriet quickly asked as she hurried over to the door.

Nora's voice stumbled as she tried to speak, she could see the grief that Harriet was holding. "Y-yeah… I think we need to talk about some stuff," Nora practically mumbled.

It took a few tries for Harriet to place her key into the lock before she twisted the key and barged the recently stiff door open with her shoulder. Harriet gave a small humorous smile before nodding towards Nora to enter her home. The speedster slowly stepped into the apartment and looked around at how normal and cosy the place seemed. She walked over towards the couch and stopped as she saw a picture of Luke in his old police uniform standing beside a handsome well-built man. Nora grimaced and hatred swelled up in the back of her throat.

"You probably haven't seen that picture before," Harriet spoke as she locked the door behind them and then dropped the keys on the nearest surface, "that's Luke and his old partner, my husband, Sam. I'm sure you've heard of him, right?"

Nora closed her eyes and took a deep breath to calm herself, then nodding in agreement to Harriet, "Yeah, I've heard a thing or two about him."

Harriet smiled and released a snort as she seemed to quickly reminisce the past, "they were one hell of a pair I can tell you that."

Nora smiled along with the woman's brief spout of happiness, "I can imagine."

"They were always laughing and joking around when I was with them. It was almost like they were brothers. That's how I saw them anyway, especially when Luke went out of his way to help me and Kelly… with everything." Harriet crumbled with a croak as she finished her sentence. Nora pulled the woman in to a tight hug and held her, "It's okay… I know how it hurts to lose someone you love. But you have to be strong, not just for them but for yourself"

Nora could feel Harriet nod her head against her shoulders, "I get that," she mumbled, "but… but Kelly-"

Nora held Harriet even tighter now so that she wouldn't see the tears that were streaming down her own face. She never got to meet Kelly while Luke was alive, and he had always talked about introducing her to the little bundle of joy, but the chance never came up and now it never will, not in the happy way that she was expecting anyway.

After a few moments passed Harriet pulled herself away from Nora's arms and wiped the moisture from her red face. Nora motioned Harriet to take a seat on the couch and she followed closely behind to sit beside her.

"I'm sorry for showing up unannounced," Nora spoke, "but it's to do with what happened with Luke."

Harriet's eyes widened and then they fell sombre once more, "if it's the details then I don't want to know."

Nora shook her head, "not the details, but who killed him."

The blonde woman squinted her eyes as she was curious about why Nora had come to her apartment to tell her this. Her stare silently told Nora to continue.

"It's the arson case, I know that you know about it. Luke found who was burning the buildings and it was done in some sick manner to remind him of what happened to Sam…"

Nora stopped as she saw the heartbreak on Harriet's face as she remembered. Nora felt horrendous for making her remember the night, she didn't know why she was doing this. That's a lie. She knew exactly why.

"The arsonist… he was one of the men who was there that night and he wanted revenge for what happened to his buddy. He's still out there, and he will probably try to talk to you so I want to give you this," Nora reached into one of her pockets and held out a small wristband, "if someone with burned skin tries to contact you or talks to you in person I want you to push the button on this and that speedster from Central City, XS, will be there in an instant."

Harriet's face expressed multiple emotions in quick succession after hearing what Nora had to say. She was frightened upon hearing that she and Kelly could be in danger but was hopeful that somebody was willing to help her. But she was curious, "How do you know that that superhero will help me?" she asked.

Nora gave a soft smile, "she worked with Luke a few times, and she wants to help protect both you and Kelly. It's what he would have wanted."

The blonde woman released a hopeful grin, "Thank you Nora…"

Nora stood up from the couch and told Harriet that there was no reason to thank her, that she was just helping because it was what Luke would have wanted. The guilt was there though, the hint of guilt that she was partly using Harriet to get to Sam. If she knew the truth that Sam was still alive, then her attitude might be different about this whole thing and it wasn't something that Nora was willing to risk.

"There is reason to thank you, so don't sell yourself short," Harriet scolded, "you didn't have to come here to help me and my daughter, I know that you're going through a lot. I've been there. Just be hopeful, okay? Things do get better Nora. I'm a pretty good example of that."

Nora's lips quivered and her throat tightened. She knew Harriet was right, things do get better. But what do you do during the times when everything is so terrible? Do you just bury your head and wait? Or do you try to be tough and power through ordeals like this? The only answer Nora could give to that question is to find a way for closure and for her, closure is seeing Sam locked up behind bars to never see sunlight again. That's what he deserved.

Harriet noticed the conflicted look on Nora's face, she smiled to her guest and placed a hand on her shoulder, "would you like to meet Kelly? She's been wanting to meet you ever since Luke first mentioned you."

Nora released a genuine smile for what seemed like the first time in forever, "Yeah… yeah I would love to meet her."


	19. Uphill

For the first time in a while, Nora felt a level of warmth in her chest. She was actually excited for something again; she was excited to meet the little girl that brought so much joy into Luke's life. She couldn't help but feel happiness just from that thought, that Kelly was a connection to Luke that she had never seen before.

Nora was sat in the passenger seat as Harriet battled through the busy roads of Keystone City. Before she discovered her speed, Nora was completely fine with being caged in a car for long periods of time, but now she finds nothing else so boring. She would rather feel the wind against her face as she bolts across the ground like thunder.

"Do you have any nieces or nephews?" Harriet asked, unintentionally interrupting Nora's thoughts.

Nora raised her head from the rumbling window and shook it a little to snap back into reality. Harriet's question made her laugh inside her head as she thought of her answer because despite having a big family, she was in her own generation apart from her Aunt Jenny who was just a few years older than her. Nora didn't have a sibling, she never really considered how having one might have affected her life, the closest person she would have had to such a relationship would have been with her best friend Lia but… that wasn't a subject she wanted to get into.

"Um… No, I don't have any. I have a few younger cousins though, but not all of them are blood related," Nora replied with a small shrug.

"Ah," Harriet smirked, "so you're really not prepared for how hyper a little kid can be"

Nora gave a little laugh, "I should have asked my mom for tips, I was just like Kelly by the sounds of it."

Harriet laughed and leaned forward to look for an opening to turn into the next road. "Kelly really has been a blessing in my life. The last few weeks though, even if she doesn't really understand, she has taken my mind away from everything that has happened," she spoke to herself.

"I can imagine…" Nora mumbled.

The two sat there in silence for a few moments and as Nora began to open her mouth to fill the silence Harriet's phone began to ring. The blonde-haired woman sighed and reached over to the backseat to grab her bag from behind once she had found an opening to do so. "I know you're a cop, but can you just pretend you didn't see that?" Harriet joked which made Nora smirk. Harriet looked at her phone and then passed it over to Nora as the traffic began to move forward again, "can you answer that for me? It's Grant's parents, they're looking after Kelly. Tell them we're on our way."

Nora was caught by surprise and stammered to try and say no but the phone was thrust into her hands. The speedster swiped a finger across the phone and spoke into the phone, "Hello? Harriet is busy right now but we're on the way."

"She's gone!" the old voice spoke.

Nora's heart stopped. "Kelly's gone?" she spoke aloud. Harriet's eyes darted towards Nora and then she pulled the car over as quickly as she could.

"What happened?!" Nora quickly questioned to the grandmother while pressing the speaker button on the phone.

"Some man came into our home and asked to see Kelly. I told him he couldn't, but he just took her!" the voice buzzed. Nora looked to her left and saw the concern on Harriet's face. "Did you call the police?!" She barked.

"Of course I did!" the voice replied.

Nora's heart sank and her mind was running a million miles a minute. Sam had taken his daughter, but she had absolutely no idea how she was supposed to find him. After all it had taken Luke years and Sam was only found because he stepped out into the open.

"Harriet," Nora spoke to her companion who was arguing with the old lady on the other side of the device. "Harriet!" Nora spoke louder to grab her attention. The blonde-haired woman turned to Nora, "what is it?" she questioned.

"Sam. Did he and Kelly ever go somewhere with just the two of them? Like a father-daughter day out kind of thing? Like that picture you showed me of Luke and you?" The speedster asked.

"Why does Sam have anything to do with this?" The woman asked.

"Just answer the question," Nora spoke in a calm tone. Harriet simply nodded. "We need to go there. Trust me." Nora spoke again. She knew that Sam was sentimental, Luke had told her as much.

Nora saw the look of expression on Harriet's face and she was unsure if she had already pieced together that Sam was alive simply by Nora's question. Maybe she just didn't want to ask, but Harriet pulled the car back onto the main road and drove in a hurry and with determination.

A few minutes passed in silence until Harriet began to sniff her nose and wipe her eyes. Nora didn't know what to say to the woman beside her, she didn't know if she should tell her the truth at this very moment or to let her see for herself in-case she would be angered at Nora's claim. As these thoughts ran wild in her mind time began to pass quickly until the car stopped beside a path and Harriet slammed the door behind her as she began to run. The Speedster jolted at the sound of the door and quickly stepped out of the car, "Harriet, wait!" she called out to the blonde woman who refused to listen.

"Harriet!" she called out again, "Let me go first, it could be dangerous!"

Harriet continued to ignore Nora. She wanted to make sure that her little girl was safe herself. It was her job, not some woman's who she barely knew. Harriet climbed up the grassy hill and as she reached the top of it she saw it. A sight she didn't expect to see. Kelly was on top of a man's shoulders as they looked down towards the wide landscape of Keystone City. It was something her daughter had only done with her father.

Harriet's throat swelled and she was unable to speak. A small squeak escaped her mouth as she opened it which had her daughter look over her shoulder towards her mother.

"Mommy!" the little girl beamed, "Dad is back!"

Harriet fell to her knees.

The man lifted Kelly from his shoulders and placed her down onto the ground. "Go and hug your mother," the voice spoke.

Harriet knew. That voice hit her in the heart and she just knew. That man was her husband.

Kelly ran towards her mother and wrapped her arms around her, "Daddy came to Grandma's and told me that we were coming here! I was so happy!" she whispered loudly into her mother's ear. The child couldn't contain her glee.

Harriet embraced her daughter and then pulled back from the hug. "Kelly baby, can you give me and your father some time to talk? Luke's girlfriend is down the path and she really wants to meet you," she hesitantly smiled. Kelly's face lit up again and she ran off behind her mother and towards Nora.

"I'm sorry I didn't come back sooner," The graveled voice spoke but it received no reply.

Sam hesitated before speaking once more, "I just couldn't live with myself. I was filled with so much anger and hate that I had become… This. Do you know what it's like to have your life ripped away from you? I… I…" before he could finish, he felt a hand on his shoulder pulling him softly, as if it was asking for him to turn around. So he did.

Sam was met with the hardest punch that he had ever felt in his life. "Years!" Harriet screamed, "For years I thought you were dead! Kelly thought you were dead! How dare you come back like this!"

Sam reeled from the punch and scrunched up his face. A part of him didn't know how to react to what his wife was saying… she wasn't saying anything about how he looked, and it shocked him.

"I'm sorry…" were the only words that he could really muster, he thought he knew what he was going to say to her, he had a whole script inside his head, but it vanished as Harriet's punch connected. When he looked closely at his wife's face for the first time in many years, he noticed every little detail that he fell in love with the first time he met her.

"You haven't changed one bit, have you?" Sam smiled the first genuine smile that he had done in a very long time. Harriet laughed and her lips quivered as she attempted to hold back the tears she had left.

"You…" she croaked, "you certainly have."

There was a silence. It wasn't awkward, or due to anger, it was just two people not knowing what to say as they spent the moment in the others presence.

"I've missed you… So very much…" Same whispered as he pulled her into a tight embrace.

A giggle sounded beside his leg and Sam looked down beside him as he felt his daughter hug him. His eyes moved from his daughter to see Nora stood watching but giving them space.

Sam pulled from the hugs and gave his wife a pained smile, "I need to speak to Nora. Alone."

His wife looked confused and frustrated, "Nora? Why? Why would you need to?" she questioned.

Nora lightly stepped forward and gave a meek smile, "It'll be okay, you'll be able to see him again."

The man looked at Nora quizzingly but then sighed and nodded. "Take Kelly down to your car Harriet, I'll be there soon."

After a brief pause and a silent protest Harriet closed her eyes, exhaled, and nodded in agreement. "Fine. But I want answers soon enough."

After the blonde woman and her daughter were no longer in a distance to be able to hear them speak Nora stepped beside the man who killed her boyfriend and together, they looked over Keystone City.

"Did you find what you were looking for?" Nora asked.

"Not quite," Sam spoke. "I never really will."

"Why's that?" Nora responded in a monotone voice.

"I'm never going to be able to live with what I've done. And that's not something I should be able to do anyway," Sam replied. "You do know that I regret every single bad thing that I have done, right?"

"I don't believe you," Nora shook her head in disbelief, "You killed him. That you can regret. But you still killed him."

Sam nodded. "I did, and that's something I'm going to have to live with my entire life behind bars."

This time the Speedster turned her gaze from the city and looked at the murderer beside her. "So you're going to come in willingly?" she asked, it was what she had hoped for because she certainly didn't want to drag him kicking and screaming. In this situation, she wanted to give him the chance to explain everything to his wife before what comes next.

"I will. I can't go on living a 'normal' life, I know that's what he hoped for me, but Luke really was an idiot with his optimism." He lightly chuckled. "Would you give me the chance to speak to my family before it happens?" he asked.

Nora gave a hesitant smile and nodded towards their direction. "Go on," Nora replied, "but I hope you realize that they're going to find out everything. It's probably better that Harriet hears it from you."

The Speedster watched as Sam walked down the pathway between the trees and a sense of relief washed over her. This had all worked out as well as it possibly could. However, it still didn't feel like a victory to her. She had still lost so much. Maybe that's just what it means when you live the sort of life where you encounter heroes and villains on a regular basis, that just because you're good, it doesn't mean that you don't experience the bad. Whether they wear costumes or look like everyone else, people decide on what side of the line they want to be on… that was what she had always thought to herself. It's what she was taught to think. But if her time in the past has taught her one thing, it's that not everyone gets to decide. Life puts people in the position where they sometimes don't have a choice. Sometimes life fucks you over to the point where you fall from the good and go into the bad. Sometimes life will have you riding that line dipping into both sides. It doesn't get to make sense. None of it does.

What does make sense, is that you try to do the best that you possibly can with what you are given. So that was what she was going to do.


	20. Its About Time

Joe had been part of all this craziness for years, he usually says that he's no longer surprised by anything. That has never been the truth at all, everyone knows it because of the constant look of confusion on his face. He has that look on his face right now as he enters the CSI Lab to see Nora hard at work.

"What are you doing?" he asked her.

Nora looks at Joe with a quick smile and then moves the bundle of files to the side of her with haste. "Nothing," she replied, "just getting through all of this."

"I… I can see that?" He began, "but shouldn't you be with Singh?"

Nora shook her head.

Joe furrowed his brow and stepped forward towards Nora's desk, "Okay…" he muttered with extension. "Why not? Don't you need to be there for Sam's questioning?"

"No." Nora answered, not even looking towards Joe.

The old detective placed a hand onto Nora's desk and leaned against it, catching a glimpse at the files Nora was looking through he noticed both Luke and Sam's names.

"Talk to me Nora," Joe sighed, "if you aren't involved with what is happening with him, then why are you looking through those?"

"It doesn't matter," Nora replied as she stood up from her chair and walked over towards the whiteboard, then removing the ink that had drawn multiple lines with loops coming from the end to the beginning and the middle point to a line below that.

Joe watched his granddaughter "Is that what I think it is?"

"Science?" Nora joked lightly before reaching for a black jacket to wrap around her torso, "because if you think that it's science then it definitely is what you think it is."

"You're not thinking of going back in time, are you?" Joe questioned, his tone that of a simple question. Nora looked at her grandfather and gave a pained smile. Joe hesitated, before returning one back to her. "Listen Nora, I understand the way you feel, I really do." Joe began, "When Francine left me and Iris there was nothing more I wanted to do than to go back in time and make it so none of the bad stuff every happened. A part of me still wants it, so that my children could have grown up in a full house. Iris, Barry, and Wally."

Nora began to fiddle with her fingers as she listened to the man who's opinion she values nearly the most.

"But Look at my life now Nora. I have everything that I could have asked for. I understand that something terrible has happened to you and someone you love, but part of life is learning to live with that and using that hurt to make your life better than what it was before, and better than it can be."

"That's the thing Papa Joe" Nora smiled with a weak quiver of her lip and a croak, "I can't learn to live with it. Not after everything that has happened and going to happen. I just can't."

Joe stepped forward and pulled Nora into a hug and kissed her head, "come on babygirl," he replied, "you're the strongest person I've met. You're stronger than both your parents put together."

"Which is why I'm going this," Nora mumbled. Pulling from her grandfathers embrace she looked into his eyes, "Will you help me?"

Nora didn't know what her grandfather's answer would be. To him, this choice would be between Barry and her. To Nora, she knew that he would pick Barry every time.

"What will happen if I do?" Joe questioned, "You know, time-wise?"

Nora's gaze turned form Joe. "Luke lives, and so do I."

* * *

Nora opened the door and, in her sight, sat Sam, cuffed to the table. He was dressed in grey CCPD clothing. His burned face gave Nora a blank expression, and she returned the same.

"They have a lot of questions for me," Sam muttered. "How long till I get put away?"

Nora shut the door behind her and took a seat opposite Luke's murderer. "Not long now," Nora replied in a monotone voice. "I need to ask you something," Nora began, "If I had the chance to stop you in the past. Where would have been the best place to do so?" she questioned.

"The abandoned Ace Chemicals factory. That is where I was before I went to bring Luke out and… and kill him and those other bastards. "

"Okay." Nora replied, "thanks."

As she began to stand up from her seat Sam spoke once more. "My girls," he mumbled, "They'll be okay, right?"

Nora pressed her lips and then gave him a warm smile, "Yeah, they will be."

"Promise me." Sam croaked.

"It's crazy how someone like you still has a heart," Nora answered, "But I promise. They'll be okay and they won't be dragged into this. Captain Singh will make sure of it."

Sam chuckled. "Him?"

"What's so funny?" Nora questioned.

Sam tilted his head and drew attention to a recently made bruise on under his left eye. "He's not a fan of me."

Nora stood up from her chair and turned away from the murderer. "Nobody is."

As Nora opened the door to leave she was met with her grandfather and her father. Barry gave her a small smile and a nod, "We've just got some more questions for him," he spoke. Nora stood to the side and held the door open, "be my guest."

Barry stepped into the room and Joe closely followed, nodding to his granddaughter before taking out his meta-dampening cuffs. Nora closed the door behind her and hoped that Joe would do his job. She couldn't believe that he was willing to go this far to help her, but that is what Joe West does. He helps people who need it. After running to her lab to grab her costume she made her way to the long street that sat in front of CCPD. She knew that the civilians were looking at her and snapping pictures, but she didn't care and drowned out the distracting noise of the crowd speaking and their devices clicking. She took three deep breaths and ran as fast as she possibly could. She felt the lightning crackle throughout her body and her surroundings became nothing but a blur with streaks of light. In a less than a moment she was barreling through the time stream thinking of where she wanted to go: Days before Luke's death.

When she left the portal she slid to a halt, looking around the night-time surroundings of Central City. She pushed a button on her left gauntlet and Gideon appeared, "How can I help you Nora Allen?"

"Gideon, tell me the time and date." She ordered.

"The time is twenty-three, fifty-seven. And the date today is the twelfth of November two-thousand and eighteen," the robotic voice replied.

"Shit." Nora spoke to herself. "I don't have long."


	21. This Version

From the building beside them she could see it all, she could see everything that led right up to Luke's death. The two of them, Sam and Luke, were having a stand off and Nora was waiting for the right moment. The moment when Luke will realize the type of person that Sam is because that is the only way he'll stop chasing after him and stay with her.

She stepped forward from behind the wall as she saw Sam turn and draw his weapon. Was this the moment? She felt lightning crackle throughout her body but she stopped when she saw Sam had lowered the gun, she couldn't hear what they were saying but it had to be something important. A few moments later she noticed the crooks leaving the warehouse, what soon followed was the brawling between the two friends. This was the moment.

The speedster bolted towards the warehouse, disarmed the makeshift bombs and brought all the criminals to safety and tied them up to ensure they wouldn't escape. She then ran past the building and barreled right towards the two men.

Nora reached towards the collar of Sam's coat and threw him from Luke and into the hood of the car the two had arrived in. The detective led there with a few cuts and bruises on his face, but it was nothing like last time. He took a deep breath, looking upside-down at the speedsters back who was standing between him and Sam. He rolled onto his torso and saw Sam indented into the car.

"How the hell?" he muttered to himself.

Sam fell forward from the car and pulled himself from the ground, "that… that hurt."

The Arsonist spat some blood onto the ground and looked up towards the costumed woman slowly walking towards him. "Oh? The new superhero? Of course this the kind of bullshit I get dealt with."

The murderer managed to clamber to his knees as XS stood before him, "I hope one day you'll realize that putting on a uniform doesn't make you good. It doesn't make you a hero. Go and ask that piece of shit behind you and then maybe-"

Sam's speech was cut off with a quick punch to the side of his head, knocking him out cold. Nora pulled out some handcuffs and cuffed one of his hands to the grill of the car. When she turned around she noticed Luke was lying on his back again, looking into the sky.

Nora sped over to him in fear. This couldn't happen, not after everything that she has went through. There was no way she was going to let him die again.

"Luke?!" She called out as she stopped on her knees beside him. Luke looked at her through the tears in his eyes and laughed, "You know my name? Should I even be surprised?"

Nora, overcome with emotion, burst into tears and cried onto his chest. The Detective was confused and gave her an awkward pat on her back, "Are you okay XS? I… er…" he stammered not knowing what to say.

"You're alive," XS croaked, "I did it."

XS leaned back onto her knees and pulled her mask from her eyes, she smiled through her quivering lips. "It's me," she said with a crack in her voice.

Luke sat up from the ground and Looked into the eyes of the one he loved. "I should have known," he replied with an awkward laugh, "that mask doesn't really cover much, does it?"

Nora laughed and placed her forehead against his, "You never were the best detective," she laughed in return before pressing her lips against his with all of her love. She never thought she would see him again but there he was, with his lips against hers. She did it, she saved him. She saved him. She saved him. She kept her promise.

Luke pulled himself from Nora who hesitantly let him go, "how did you know?" he asked her, "that I was here?"

Nora paused for a moment and looked away. "This is going to be a lot to explain and a lot for you to take in," she admitted, "and it is all the truth."

Luke slowly nodded, promising he'd listen and believe her.

"Okay," she sighed, "I'm from the year 2049 and I am the daughter of The Flash. I never met him in my time, so I came back to this time to meet him. Only… only I met you and everything changed," she admitted, wiping away a tear she continued, "I've never had someone like you in my life before, you're someone who saw me for who I was and not for what I was supposed to be. You changed everything. And now I've changed it all for this moment."

Luke's brow furrowed, "you've changed it all? What do you mean?"

Nora pulled out a leather journal, "take this and give it to me when you go home."

"Give it to you? But, you're here?" he questioned.

Nora bit her lip and closed her eyes, before looking into Luke's and telling him about what happened. "You died Luke. You died in my arms right here and Sam is the one who killed you. The Nora asleep in our apartment right now is the past me. But this version of me, I'm from weeks ahead in the future who has had to deal with the fact that I couldn't save you."

Luke pulled her into a tight embrace, "You've saved me now. I'm here."

"Luke," Nora whispered, "I don't have much time."

"You do, we have all the time in the world," Luke replied as he pulled her head onto his shoulder.

"No," Nora hesitated, "The timeline has changed," she spoke. Luke felt the grasp of Nora's hand leave his back. He moved back from her to see her right arm had disappeared into pieces of glowing blue flying into the night sky. "What's happening?!" he blurted out.

"I saved you so this version of me doesn't exist, but the other me does. We can spend the rest of our lives together, that's all I want Luke. So give her the journal, don't forget," Nora smiled.

"Please don't go Nora…" Luke cried.

"I told you that this would be difficult back in that hotel room, didn't I?" she smiled a pained smile. "I love you Luke. I really do love you."

"I love you too," Luke replied before moving in and placing his lips against hers.

Within a moment, the feeling of her tender kiss disappeared. Luke opened his eyes, and she was gone. All that was left was the leather journal on the wet ground and blue pieces of light floating away.


	22. Journal

His hands were shaking, and his right leg was bouncing as he sat on the armchair beside the couch that Nora was sleeping on. What was he supposed to say when he wakes her up? That she had revealed who she was to him, that she was XS except it wasn't really her, but it was a future version that isn't this future version. Is that right? He didn't know. He had watched a few time travel movies, but they all told him something different. How was he supposed to know which one was right? Luke put his hands on his face, leaned back and audibly groaned in frustration. When his head dropped back down, he noticed Nora had opened her eyes with a groggy expression, "Why are you groaning?" she mumbled.

"It's nothing, go back to sleep," Luke replied in hopes he could find some more time to think about what to say. Unluckily for him however Nora slowly pulled herself up from her sleep, rubbed her eyes, and yawned, "Tell me…"

Luke leaned into the left of the armchair and rested a cheek on his fist. Nora raised an eyebrow and turned her body to face him as she changed how she sat on the couch, "Nope," Nora began, "we're not doing the silent treatment," she half smirked. Nora's hint of a smile faded when noticed the leather journal sat on Luke's lap. Her journal. "Why do you have that?"

Luke's heart skipped a beat in fear. Not in fear of Nora, but in fear of what he had to explain. He had to think back to her dying in his arms. He didn't know what the right thing to do or say was, so he instead just held out the journal to her with his gaze avoiding her direction.

Nora looked confused; she didn't have any idea what this could be about because he sure as hell couldn't read the language that was written on the paper. This was scaring her to no end. "Luke… what's going on?"

"Just read it… I think? I was told to give it to you." He replied. Nora took hold of the journal in her hands. She noticed the paper at the back had gotten wet and still hadn't fully dried. She unwrapped the coil around it and began to flick through the pages. The speedster noticed that there was an entry from a few days from now.

"It's been so difficult. I thought I could save him but, in the end, I was stupid and thought I had more time. Ironic, right? The girl from the future could not save the boy from the past. At least I had some comfort knowing that his funeral… it had a lot of people there. A lot of people who cared. Or at least I think they did, I have not much experience with his friends other than the one who murdered him. Sam. I'm going to bring him in or kill him. I haven't decided which one it'll be yet. He is going to pay. That I will make sure of."

Nora looked at him with water in her eyes, but Luke still wasn't looking at her. He was just blankly staring along the wall beside him.

She turned to the next page.

"Two weeks since the last entry. What am I even doing here anymore? I am not happy. I cannot be happy. And I will not be happy. This must have been how mom felt when she lost dad. I always felt like she was just using it as an excuse for the bad parenting that I thought she was giving me. But she was just a heartbroken woman trying her best to raise the child of her true love. I wish she would visit me and help me. She's been giving me space after dad had stopped me multiple times from going back in time. I don't want space. I want someone to be here for me. What am I even doing writing this?"

Nora looked at Luke again this time. And this time he looked at her with his lips shaking as he tried to hold back the tears, he had himself. Nora noticed there was one more entry from her future self, so she turned her attention back to her journal before she broke down and became unable to read it.

"I did it. I arrested Sam. He, for some reason, came in quietly after wanting to see his daughter in person again. I would have never thought a monster like him would want something as simple as that, but it turns out some monsters do have some love in their heart; Even after the atrocious things that they do. I'm going to go back. I'm going to save Luke. Sam has shown me that it's worth it to be selfish and at the same time selfless when it comes to those you love. He could have gone into hiding and somehow start a new life with what he had left, but he chose to see his family one more time and because of that he has to atone for what he did. That was the choice he made. The choice I'm going to make is the same. I'm going to save Luke, even if it means that this version of me must die in his place. But in the end, it will all work out. It has to."

Nora closed the book and placed it beside her before standing up to move towards Luke. She took one of his hands and pulled him up from his seat and embraced him as tightly as she possibly could. Luke pulled her in as close as their bodies would allow, "I love you." He whispered.

"I'm sorry you had to see… I'm sorry that you saw me die. I'm sorry that I did that to you," she croaked. "But it was the only way to save you Luke. I don't want to do this without you," she mumbled, "I guess you know that now."

"I knew it before," Luke replied, and Nora could feel the small hint of a smile against her cheek, "I knew it every time you smiled at me, playfully hit me, and even when you groaned at my terrible jokes."

Nora released a quick, and very short chuckle in disbelief. "You really are one very mushy person, aren't you?" she teased. Luke pulled away from the hug and smiled. The smile didn't last long until his eyebrows furrowed, and his eyes grew sad.

"There is something else, isn't there?" Luke spoke, "There's a problem you're ignoring. I can see it on your face."

Nora looked away and bit her lip in frustration. "There is."

"So what is it?" Luke worried.

"Your death…" Nora hesitated, "It's a fixed point in time."

"You're speaking as if I should know what that means. Am I meant to die?" The Detective questioned. Nora simply nodded. "Oh." Luke replied, "How do I, like, you know… not die?" he semi-joked, not being able to come to terms with the idea of his death.

"I have one idea, but I don't think that you're going to be too happy about it when you find out the sacrifices you're going to have to make." Nora spoke with a heavy heart. What she was about to suggest, it will change everything for Luke. His life and the way he will live it. The people he knows. The world he will live in.

"Will I still be with you?" Luke asked as his eyes looked deeply into hers,

"Of course you will. You're stuck with me now," Nora smiled.

"Then that is all I'll ever need," he smiled in return and kissed her lips.


	23. I'm Here

The orange glow of the sun continued to illuminate the town ahead of him. It was almost ethereal to look at, especially when compared to the normalcy of Central City; well, 'normalcy' wasn't the best word to describe a city like that. All his life he was used to tall buildings and the sound of traffic yet here he was, stood at the edge of the town looking at something that was normal in every sense of the word.

The old man tightened his grip around his old wooden cane and shuffled forward in search of the destination he had been looking for. All around him he could see people smiling and laughing. He could see children running around playing games. He could see the glint of the ocean sparkle in his view. If this really was the place he was looking for, he couldn't be any happier than how he felt right now. As he admired the town a small little dog with white fur and a patch of brown on the right side of its face came trotting up towards him and despite not being too good at knowing the different breeds of dog, he could at the very least tell that this little pup was a Pitbull.

"Hey there little one," the man spoke with a wavy tone as he slowly leaned down to pet the dog. The dog stuck his tongue out and wagged his tail as the man's hand rubbed his head. "What's your name then?" he asked the animal as he moved his hand to look at the collar. The smile that appeared from his face was as wide as it was on his wedding day. The dog's name was Skip but that wasn't what made him smile so much; what did make him smile was that the name was imprinted onto a piece of metal hanging from the collar… in the shape of a lightning bolt. He was in the right place. He had to be.

"Skip sure likes you," one of the employees from the ice cream stand beside him spoke. The old man gave Skip one last pat before standing all the way up. "Does he not usually like people?" The visitor asked.

The man behind the layout of ice cream chuckled and smiled, "oh he loves everyone, he's the town mascot at this point. I'm just wondering if he'll ever not let anyone pet him," he laughed again.

"The owners of this dog," The visitor began, "Where can I find them? Do you know?" he asked.

"Hmm…." The man pretended to think, "that would be just down this road and the first building on your right. It's facing right towards the ocean, you'll love it. I'm sure Skip will take you if you ask him nicely," he smiled.

The visitor looked down towards the pup which was now tilting its head with its ears perked up. "How about it Skip? Will you take me to your home?" he asked. The pup barked and began to trot ahead. Skip would periodically turn around and stop when he would notice that the old man couldn't keep up. Eventually the two of them reached the end of the street and turned to see a café that had the sun's shine reflecting from the glass. Above the door and the front window of the café there was a sign that read  _Café Dawn._ The old man peered into the window before entering but saw no employees inside. Skip walked into the building through the flap at the bottom of the door, so the old man followed and closed the door behind him.

The pup barked and then shuffling could be heard from the kitchen behind counter. "One second!" a familiar voice called out to him. A voice he couldn't believe he was hearing, it was a soft, sweet sounding voice that sounded like it hadn't aged at all. "Take all the time in the world," the old man replied with a humorous tone to which the familiar voice responded with a laugh.

A few moments later a relatively short woman stepped out from the kitchen with her hair tied back and a wide smile on her face, "Good afternoon and Welcome to Café Dawn," she began as she focused on tying her apron around her waist, "How may we serve you tod-" she stopped. She couldn't believe what she was seeing.

"Good Afternoon Ognats," the old man grinned.

The woman covered her mouth with her hands in disbelief, but she soon removed them to reveal a genuine smile. She hurried around the counter and all the fresh food she had made earlier in the day to hug her visitor, "It's so good to see you David!" she called out as she embraced him. The old man chuckled and hugged her in return, "I know you said not to search for the two of you, but I couldn't help it."

Nora reluctantly pulled away from the hug and placed her hands onto David's shoulders, "It's fine, don't worry about it," she reassured him, "and you look great!" she complimented but David shook his head dismissing her compliment. "I wish," he laughed, "And you have barely changed after, what? Thirty-Something years? How many years has it been? For you I mean."

Nora gave a sad smile and then motioned him to take a seat at the closest table nearby to which Skip followed closely and hopped onto the booth to sit next to David. "It's been three years for us," she admitted. David smiled and nodded towards her left hand, "and that ring? How new is that?" he questioned.

Nora moved her left hand towards David who took hold of it to get a closer look. "Only two weeks," she laughed, "knowing how slow Luke is, it will probably be three more years until he actually marries me" she laughed.

Nora grew silent, and then spoke again, "We really are sorry by the way. To everyone."

David, again, shook his head. "I don't want to hear it. You explained yourselves back then and we all understood it."

"But to ask him to abandon you and everyone else…" Nora mumbled.

David placed his spare hand onto the other that was already holding Nora's, "He needed to be taken out of that time period to survive. I would have forced him to do it myself if he didn't do it for you." He informed her. "And besides," he began again as he looked around the new life they had built, "it looks like you got your happy-ending," he smiled.

Nora wiped the forming tears from her eyes with her spare hand, "and I'm pretty sure you're about to get yours," she croaked through her happy smile as she looked behind David.

David's eyes remained on Nora; he was almost too scared to turn around. He was terrified that this isn't who he thought it would be. Nora gave a warm smile and nodded. David took a deep breath and turned to look at the man stood beside the table. It was him. It was his Nephew.

The old grizzled police chief's eyes began to water and his face began to quiver despite trying to hide his emotions. Skip jumped down from the booth as David moved as fast as he possibly could from the seat to hug the Nephew that he hadn't seen in thirty-three years. "My boy," David cried, "you're here."

Luke smiled to Nora through his own tears as his head rested on top of David's head. "I'm here," Luke croaked, "I'm here."


End file.
